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UP IN MAINE 

Stories of Yankee Life Told in 
Verse by 

HOLMAN F. DAY 

o 

With an Introduction by 
C. E. LITTLEFIELD 




Boston 

Small, Maynard & Company 

1900 



Copyright, I^OO, by 

Small, Maynard £5* Company, 

( Incorporated^ ) 



Entered at Stationers^ Hall, 




Reckzvell and Churchill Press 
Boston y U,S,A, 



LC Control Number 



2002 328515 



TO MY FRIEND 
AND FELLOW IN THE CRAFT OF LETTERS 

WINFIELD M. THOMPSON 

TO WHOM I AM INDEBTED 

FOR MORE THAN ONE OF THE STORIES 

TOLD HEREIN 

THIS VOLUME IS DEDICATED 



PREFACE 

I don't know how to weave a roundelay, 
I couldn't voice a sighing song of love ; 

No mellow lyre that on which I play ; 
I plunk a strident lute without a glove. 

The rhythm that is running through my stuff 
Is not the whisp of maiden's trailing gown ; 

Tlie metre, maybe, gallops rather rough. 
Like river-drivers storming down to town. 

— It's more than likely something from the 

wood. 
Where chocking axes scare the deer and 

moose ; 
A homely rhyme, and easy understood 

— An echo from the weird domain of Spruce. 

Or else it's just some Yankee notion, dressed 

In rough-and-ready " Uncle Dudley " phrase ; 
Some honest thought we common folks suggest, 

— Some tricksy mem'ry-fiash from boyhood's 
days. 

I cannot polish off this stilted rhyme 

With all these homely notions in my brain. 
A sonnet, sir, would stick me every time ; 

Let's have a chat 'bout common things in 
Maine. 

HoLMAN F. Day. 



CONTENTS 






Page 


Round Home : 




Aunt Shaw's Pet Jug 


3 


Old Boggs's Slarnt 


6 


Cy Nye, Prevaricator 


8 


Uncle Benjy and Old Crane 


11 


"Plug" 


13 


The Song of the Harrow and Plow 


15 


Hooray for the Season of Pairs 


17 


Had a Set of Double Teeth 


20 


Grampy's Lullaby 


23 


Hoskins's Cow 


27 


An Old Stun' Wall 


31 


The Stock in the Tie-itp 


35 


Ephrum Wade's Stand-by in Haying 


39 


Eesurrection of Ephrum Way 


41 


Look out for your Thumb 


44 


The Triumph of Modest Maria 


46 


Son has got the Deed 


48 


An Idyl of Cold Weather 


52 


Busted the « Test your Strength " 


65 


« When a Man gets Old " 


57 


Pve got them Calves to Veal 


59 


The OfE Side of the Cow 


61 


The Lyric of the Buck-saw 


63 


Mister Keazle's Epitaph 


66 


Plain Old Kitchen Chap 


69 



X CONTENTS 

Page 

Takin' Comfort 73 

Ephrum kept Three Dogs 74 

Lay of Dried-apple Pie 76 

Only held his Own 78 

G-rampy sings a Song 80 

Uncle Micajah Strout 83 

The True Story of a Kicker 87 

Zek'l Pratt's Harrycane 89 

Those Pickles of Harm's 92 

" The Man I knew I Killed '' 94 

^LoNG Shore : 

Cruise of the " Nancy P.'' 99 

Tale of the Sea-faring Man 101 

Cap'n Nutter of the " Puddentame '' 107 

Good-by, Lobster 109 

Cure for Homesickness 112 

On the Old Coast Tub 114 

Tale of the Kennebec Mariner 117 

Drive^ Camp, and Wangan: 

The Law 'gainst Spike-sole Boots 123 

The Chap that swings the Axe 126 

The Song of the Wood^' Dog-watch 129 

Fiddler cured the Camp 132 

The Song of the Saw 137 

Down the Trail with Gum Packs 139 

Eear o' the Drive 142 

Matin Song of Pete Long's Cook 144 



CONTENTS 


xi 




Page 


Off for the Lumber Woods 


147 


Here's to the Stout Ash Pole 


150 


Mister What's-his-name 


153 


Ha'nts of the Kingdom of Spruce 


156 


The Hero of the Coonskin Cap 


159 


A Hail to the Hunter 


162 


HossES : 




Them Old Eazoos at Topsham Track 


167 


To Him who driv' the Stage 


174 


He backed a Blamed Old Horse 


176 


B. Brown — Hoss Orator 


181 


" Jest a Lift '' 


185 


Bart of Brighton 


188 


Goi:&f' t' School : 




The Pail I lugged to School 


195 


The Paddywhacks 


198 


That Maybasket for Mabel Fry 


200 


The Mystic Band 


204 


At the Old^^Gool'' 


207 



INTRODUCTION 

ABOUT three thousand years ago the 
-/T- '^Preacher'' declared that '^ of making 
many hooks there is no end'' This sub- 
limely pessimistic truism deserves to he con- 
sidered in connection ivith the time when it 
ivas written; otherwise it might accomvlish 
results not intended hy its author. 

It must he rememhered that in the 
'' Treacher s'' time hooks ivere altogether 
in ivriting. It should also he home in mind 
that if the handivriting which lue have in 
these daySy speaking of the period prior to 
the advent of the female typewriter^ is to he 
accepted as any criterion^ — and inasmuch 
as all concede that history repeats itself that 
may ivell he assumed^ — it is easy to under- 
stand hoio^ hy reason of its illegihility y he 
was also led to declare that '^^ much study is 
a weariness of the flesh.'' It is quite ohvious 
that this was the moving cause of his delight- 
fully doleful utterance as to hooks. Had he 
lived in this year nineteen hundred^ at either 
the closing of the nineteenth or the dawning 
of the tiventieth century ^ — as to ivhether it 
is closing or daivning I make no assertioji^ 



xiv INTRODUCTION 

— he might ivell have made the same criti- 
cisTJiy hutfro7n an optimistic standpoint, 

A competent litterateur informs me that 
there are now extant 3^725^423^201 books; 
that in America and England alone during 
the last year 12^888 hooks entered up)on a 
precarious existence ^ with the faint though 
unexpressed hope of surviving "^ lifes fitful 
fever r If the conditions of the "-Preacher s " 
time obtained to-day^ the vocabulary of 
pessimism would he inadequate for the ex- 
pression of similar views, 

A careful examination hy the ivriter^ of 
all these well-nigh innumerable monu7nents of 
learning^ discloses the fact that the ivork now 
heing introduced to what I trust may he an 
equally innumerable army of readers has no 
parallel in literature. If justification were 
neededy that fact alone justifies its existence. 
This fact,, however^ is not necessary^ as the 
all'Suffijcient fact which warrants the collec- 
tion of these unique sketches in book form is 
that no one can read them without being 
interested^ entertained^ and amused^ as loell 
as instructed and improved. '^ The stubborn 
strength of Plymouth Pock'' is noiohere 
better exemplified than on the Maine farm^ 



INTRODUCTION xv 

in the Maine woods^ on the Maine coasty or 
in the Maine 'workshop. From them the 
author of ^'^Up in Maine" has draian his 
inspiration. Rugged independence ^ single- 
ness of purpose^ unswerving integrity ^ phil- 
osophy adequate for all occasions ^ the great 
realities of life^ and a cheerful disregard of 
conventionalities J are here found in all their 
native strength and vigor. These peculiari- 
ties as delineated may he roughs perhaps 
uncouth., hut they are characteristic^ pictur- 
esque^ engaging^ and lifelike. His suhjects 
are rough diamonds. They have the inherent 
qualities from which great characters are 
developed^ and out of which heroes are made. 
Through every chink and crevice of these 
rugged portrayals glitters the sheen of pure 
goldy gold of standard iveight and fineness^ 
'^gold tried in the fire'' Finally it shoidd 
he said that this is ivhat is now knoivn as a 
hook with a purpose^ and that purpose^ as 
the author confidentially inform^ me^ is to 
sell as many copies as possihle^ which he con- 
fidently expects to do. To this most laorthy 
end I trust I may have., in a small degree ^ 
contrihuted hy this introduction. 

a E. LITTLEFIELD. 
Washington, D.C, March 17, 1900. 



'ROUND HOME 



AUNT SHAW'S PET JUG 

Now there was Uncle Elnathan Shaw, 

— Most regular man you ever saw ! 
Just half-past four in the afternoon 
He'd start and whistle that old jig tune, 
Take the big blue jug from the but'ry shelf 
And trot down cellar, to draw himself 
Old cider enough to last him through 

The winter ev'nin'. Two quarts would do. 

— Just as regular as half-past four 
Come round, he'd tackle that cellar door, 
As he had for thutty years or more. 

And as regular, too, as he took that jug 

Aunt Shaw would yap through her old cross 

mug, 
" Now, Nathan, for goodness' sake take caTe ! 
You alius trip on the second stair ; 
It seems as though you were just possessed 
To break that jug. It's the very best 
There is in town and you know it, too, 
And 'twas left to me by my great-aunt Sue. 
For goodness' sake, why don't yer lug 
A tin dish down, for ye'll break that jug ? " 
Alius the same, suh, for thirty years,. 
Alius the same old twits and jeers 
Slammed for the nineteenth thousand time 
And still we wonder, my friend, at crime. 



4 UP IN MAINE 

But Nathan took it meek's a pup 
And the worst he said was " Please shut up." 
You know what the Good Book says befell 
The pitcher that went to the old-time well ; 
Wal, whether 'twas that or his time had come, 
Or his stiff old limbs got weak and numb 
Or whether his nerves at last giv' in 
To Aunt Shaw's everlasting chin — 
One day he slipped on that second stair, 
Whirled round and grabbed at the empty air 
And clean to the foot of them stairs, ker-smack, 
He bumped on the bulge of his humped old back 
And he'd hardly finished the final bump 
When old Aunt Shaw she giv' a jump 
And screamed downstairs as mad's a bug 
" Dod-rot your hide, did ye break my jug ? " 

Poor Uncle Nathan lay there flat 
Knocked in the shape of an old cocked hat, 
But he rubbed his legs, brushed off the dirt 
And found after all that he warn't much hurt. 
And he'd saved the jug, for his last wild thought 
Had been of that ; he might have caught 
At the cellar shelves and saved his fall. 
But he kept his hands on the jug through all. 
And now as he loosed his jealous hug 
His wife just screamed, " Did ye break my 
jug?" 



'ROUND HOME . 5 

Not a single word for his poor old bones 

Nor a word when she heard his awful groans, 

But the blamed old hard-shelled turkle just 

Wanted to know if that jug was bust. 

Old Uncle Nathan he let one roar 

And he shook his fist at the cellar door ; 

" Did ye break my jug? " she was yellin' still. 

" No, durn yer pelt, but I swow I will." 

And you'd thought that the house was a-going 

to fall 
When the old jug smashed on the cellar wall. 



6 UP IN MAINE 

OLD BOGGS'S SLARNT 

Old Bill Boggs is always sayin' that he'd like to 

but he carn't ; 
He hain't never had no chances, he hain't never 

got no slarnt. 
Says it's all dum foolish tryin', 'less ye git the 

proper start, 
Says he's never seed no op'nin' so he's never 

had no heart. 
But he's chawed enough tobacker for to fill a 

hogset up 
And has spent his time a-trainin' some all-fired 

kind of pup ; 
While his wife has took in washin' and his chil- 
dren hain't been larnt 
'Cause old Boggs is alius whinin' that he's never 

got no slarnt. 

Them air young uns round the gros'ry hadn't 

oughter done the thing ! 
Now it's done, though, and it's over, 'twas a 

cracker-jack, by jing. 
Boggs, ye see, has been a-settin' twenty years on 

one old plank. 
One end h'isted on a saw hoss, t'other on the 

cistern tank. 
T'other night he was a-chawin' and he says, '' I 

vum-spt-ooo — 



TvOUND HOME 7 

Here I am a-owin' money — not a gol durn thing 

to do ! 
'Tain't no use er buckin' chances, ner er fightin' 

back at Luck, 

— Less ye have some way er startin', feller's 
sartin to be stuck. 

Needs a slarnt to git yer going " — then them 
young uns give a carnt, 

— Plank went up an' down old Boggs went — 
yas, he got it, got his slarnt. 

Course the young uns shouldn't done it — sent 

mine off along to bed — 
Helped to pry Boggs out the cistern — he warn't 

more'n three-quarters dead. 
Didn't no one 'prove the actions, but when all 

them kids was gone. 
Thunder mighty ! How we hollered ! Gab'rel 

couldn't heered his horn. 



8 UP IN MAINE 

CY NYE, PREVARICATOR 

Nye 

Thunder, how he'll lie ! 
Never has to stop and think — never has to try. 
Says he had a settin' hen that acted clean pos- 
sessed ; 
Says a kag o' powder couldn't shake her off her 

nest; 
Didn't mind a flannel rag tied around her tail ; 
Ev'ry now and then he'd take 'er, souse 'er in 

a pail ; 
Never had the least effect — feathers even friz ; 
Then she set and pecked the ice, but 'tended 

right to biz. 
'Peared to care for nothin' else 'cept to set and 

set; 
Didn't seem to care a tunket what she drunk 

or et. 
Cy he said he got so mad he thought he'd use 

'er ha'ash, 
So he went to feedin' on 'er hemlock sawdust 

mash. 
Hen she gobbled down the stuff, reg'lar as 

could be; 
'•-Reely seemed to fat 'er up," Cy says he to me. 
Shows the power of the mind when it gets a 

clutch. 



'ROUND HOME 9 

Hen imagined it was bran — helped 'er just as 

much. 
Then she hid her nest away — laid a dozen eggs ; 
'Leven chickens that she hatched all had wooden 

legs, 
T'other egg it wouldn't hatch — solid junk o' 

wood, 
Hen's a-wrasslin' with it yet — thinks the thing 
is good. 

Thunder, how he'll lie ! 
But he's dry, 
— ThatCy. 

Cy 

Nye 

Tells another lie : 
Claims to be the strongest man around here ; 

this is why : 
Says he bought a side o' beef up to Johnson's store. 
Tucked it underneath his arm — didn't mind it 

more 
Than a pound o' pickled tripe ; sauntered dowai 

the road, 
Got to ponderin' Bible texts — clean forgot his 

load. 
All to once he chanced to think he meant to get 

some meat. 
Hustled back to Johnson's store t'other end the 

street. 



10 UP IN MAINE 

Bought another side o' beef. The boys com- 
menced to laugh, 
— Vummed he hadn't sensed till then he lugged 
the other half. 

Can't deny 
'T he can lie, 
— ThatCy. 



'ROUND HOME 11 

UNCLE BENJY AND OLD CRANE 

Once there was a country lawyer and his name 

was Hiram Crane, 
And he had a reputation as the worst old file in 

Maine. 
And as soon's he got a client, why, the first 

thing that he'd do 
Was to feel the critter's pocket and then soak 

him 'cordin' to. 

Well, sir, one day Benjy Butters bought a hoss, 

and oh, 'twas raw 
Way old Benjy he got roasted, and he said he'd 

have the law. 
So he gave the case to Hiram, and then Hiram 

brought a suit 
And got back the hoss and harness and what 

Benjy gave to boot. 

When he met him at the gros'ry Benjy asked 

him for the bill. 
And when Hiram named the figger, it was 

steeper'n Hobson's hill. 
Poor old Benjy hammed and swallered — bill jest 

sort of took his breath. 
And the crowd that stood a-listenin' thought 

perhaps he'd choke to death. 



12 UP IN MAINE 

But it happened that the squire felt like jokin' 

some that day, 
And he says, '' Now, Uncle Benjy, there won't be 

a cent to pay 
If you'll right here on the instant make me up a 

nice pat rhyme ; 
Hear you're pretty good at them things — give 

you jest three minutes' time." 
And the squire grinned like fury, tipped the 

crowd a knowing wink, 
While old Benjy started in, sir, almost 'fore 

you'd time to think: 

" Here you see the petty lawyer leanin' on his 

corkscrew cane. 
Sartin parties call him Gander, other people call 

him Crane. 
Though he's faowl, it's someways daoubtful 

what he is, my friends, but still 
You can tell there's hawk about him by the 

gaul-durned qritter's bill." 

Crane got mad, he wanted money, but the crowd 

let on to roar. 
And they laughed the blamed old skinflint right 

square out the gros'ry store. 



'ROUND HOME 13 

" PLUG " 

For sixty years he had borne the name 

Of " Plug " — plain " Plug." 
Those many years had his village fame 
Published the shame of his old-time game, 
Till all the folks by custom came 

To call him ''Plug." 

And so many years at last went by 
They hardly knew the reason why ; 
At least they never stopped to think, 
And dropped the old suggestive wink. 
And he took the name quite matter-of-fact, 
Till most of the folks had forgot his act ; 
But sometimes a stranger'd wonder at 
The why of a nickname such as that, 
— Of " Plug" —just "Plug." 
Then some old chap would shift his quid 
And tell the story of what he did. 

" He owned ten acres of punkin pine, 

'Twas straight and tall, and there warn't a sign 

But what 'twas sound as a hickory nut. 

And at last he got the price he sut. 

They hired him for to chop it down. 

He did. — By gosh, it was all unsoun'. 

Was a rotten heart in every tree. 

But there warn't none there but him to see. 



14 UP IN MAINE 

And quick as ever a tree was cut, 

He hewed a saplin' and plugged the butt. 

— Plugged the butt, sir, and hid away 

For about two months, for he'd got his pay. 

But there warn't no legal actions took. 

They never tackled his pocket-book. 

'T would a-broke his heart, for he's dretful snug; 

But he never squirmed when they called him 

' Plug.' 
And over the whole of the country-side. 
Up to the day that the critter died, 

'Twas ' Plug.' 
Till some of the young folks scurcely knew 
Which was the nickname, which was the true. 
He left five thousand, — putty rich, — 
But better less cash than a title sich 
As 'Plug."V 



'ROUND HOME 15 

THE SONG OF THE HARROW AND 
PLOW 

From the acres of Aroostook, broad and mellow 

in the snn, 
Down to rocky York, the chorus of the farmers 

has begun. 
They are riding in Aroostook on a patent sulky 

plow, 

— They are riding, taking comfort, for they've 
learned the secret how. 

They are planting their potatoes with a whirring 
new machine, 

— Driver sits beneath an awning ; slickest thing 
you've ever seen. 

There is not a rock to vex 'em in the acres 

spreading wide, 
So they sit upon a cushion, cock their legs, and 

smoke and ride. 
Gee and Bright go lurching onward in the 

furrow's mellow steam; 
Over there, with clank of whiffle, tugs a sturdy 

Morgan team. 
And the man who rides the planter or who plods 

the broken earth 
Joins and swells the mighty chorus of the 
season's budding mirth. 
And they've pitched the tune to a jubilant 
strain. 



16 UP IN MAINE 



n 



They are lilting it merrily now. 
We wait for that melody up here in Maine, 

— 'Tis the song of the harrow and plow. 

They are picking rocks in Oxford, and in Waldo 

blasting ledge, 
And they're farming down in Lincoln on their 

acres set on edge. 
Down among the kitchen gardens of the slopes 

of Cumberland 
They're sticking in the garden sass as thick as 

it will stand. 
And every nose is sniffing at the scent of fur- 
rowed earth. 
And every man is living all of life at what it's 

worth. 
Though the farmer in Aroostook sails across a 

velvet field, 
And his mellow, crumbly acres vomit forth a 

spendthrift yield, 
All the rest are just as cheerful on their hillside 

farms as he, 
For there's cosy wealth in gardens and a fortune 
in a tree. 
So they're singing the song of the coming 
of Spring, 
And the song of the empty mow ; 
Of the quiver of birth that is stirring the earth, 

— 'Tis the song of the harrow and plow. 



•5 



o 




'ROUND HOME 17 

HOORAY FOR THE SEASON OF FAIRS 

This is the season for fairs, by gosh, oh, this is 
the season for fairs ; 

They're thicker than spatter, 

But what does it matter ? 
They scoop up the cash, but who cares ? 

From now till October they'll swallow the 

change. 
These state fairs and town fairs and county and 

grange, 
But apples blush brighter arrayed on a plate, 
And the cattle look scrumptious in dignified 

state, 
Enthroned in a stall and a-gazing with scorn 
On the chaps going by without ribbon or horn. 
And the trotters and nags of the blood-royal 

strain 
Are a-furnishing fun for the people of Maine ; 
While prouder than princes they prance to the 

band, 
And ogle the ladies arrayed on the stand. 
Ah, every exhibit in stall or in hall. 
From hooked rug to hossflesh and punkin and 

all, 
Takes on a new meaning, assumes a new light, 
And is, for the moment, a wonderful sight. 



18 UP IN MAINE 

And people hang over the stuff that's displayed, 
They swig up whole barrels of red lemonade, 
And hark to the fakirs and tumble to snides, 
And treat all the young ones to merry-go rides. 
They sit on the grand stand, man crushed 

against man. 
All shouting acclaim to the track's rataplan ; 
And all the delight is as fresh and as bright 
As though the big crowd had not seen that same 

sight. 
And the people flock home with the dust in their 

eyes, 
But with hearts all a-fire with fun and surprise. 
The girls are a-humming the tune of the band. 
And dads are relating the sights from the stand ; 
The dames are discussing the fancy work part, 
While bub hugs the Midway scenes close to his 

heart. 
The palms of the men folks still glow from a 

grip. 
And the women are thinking of lip pressed to 

lip. 
For all of the folks in the loud, happy throng 
Have met with the friends " they've not seen 

for so long." 
A hail and salute from the press of the mass. 
Too brief, as the crowd jammed impatient to 

pass, 



'ROUND HOME 19 

A moment — that's all — to renew the old tie, 
A handgrasp, a lip-touch, " Hello," and " Good- 
by." 

Oh, this is the season of fairs, by gosh, the 
season to lay off your cares. 

Each fair is a wonder, 

They're thicker than thunder. 
Hooray for the season of fairs ! 



20 UP IN MAINE 

HAD A SET OF DOUBLE TEETH 

Oh, listen while I tell to you a truthful little 
tale 
Of a man whose teeth was double all the solid 
way around ; 
He could jest as slick as preachin' bite in two a 
shingle nail, 
Or squonch a moulded bullet, sah, and ev'ry 
tooth was sound. 

I've seen him lift a kag of pork, a-bitin' on the 
chine, 
And he'd clench a rope and hang there like a 
puppy to a root; 
And a feller he could pull and twitch and yank 
upon the line. 
But he couldn't do no bus'ness with tha 
double-toothed galoot. 

He was luggin' up some shingles, — bunch, sah, 
underneath each arm, — 
The time that he was shinglin' of the Baptist 
meetin'-house ; 
The ladder cracked and buckled, but he didn't 
think no harm, 
When all at once she busted and he started 
down kersouse. 



'ROUND HOME 21 

His head, sah, when she busted, it was jest 
abreast the eaves ; 
And he nipped, sah, quicker'n lightnin', and 
he gripped there with his teeth. 
And he never dropped the shingles, but he hung 
to both the sheaves. 
Though the solid ground was suttinly more'n 
thirty feet beneath. 

He held there and he kicked there and he 
squirmed, but no one come. 
He was workin' on the roof alone — there 
warn't no folks around. 
He hung like death to niggers till his jaws was 
set and numb, 
And he reely thought he'd have to drop them 
shingles on the ground. 

But all at once old Skillins come a-toddlin' down 
the street. 
Old Skil is sort of hump-backed and he alius 
looks straight down ; 
So he never see'd the motions of them Number 
'Leven feet. 
And he went a-amblin' by him — the goramded 
blind old clown ! 



22 UP IN MAINE 

Now this ere part is truthful — ain't a-stretchin' 
it a mite, — 
When the feller see'd that Skillins was a- 
walkin' past the place, 
Let go his teeth and hollered, but he grabbed 
back quipk and tight, 
'Fore he had a chance to tumble, and he hung 
there by the face. 

And he never dropped the shingles and he never 
missed his grip. 
And he stepped out on the ladder when they 
raised it underneath. 
And up lie went a-flukin' with them shingles on 
his hip, 
- — And there's the satisfaction of a havin' 
double teeth. 



'ROUND HOME 23 

GRAMPY'S LULLABY 

Your marmy's mixin' cream o' tartar biskit up 
for tea ; 
Fie, deedle, deedle, leetle ba-a-arby ! 
And I reckon you had better come and roost 
upon my knee ; 
Tumpy, dumpy, deedle, leetle barby ! 

I s'picion how ye never heard of Ebernezer 

Cowles. 
Tell ye what, he warn't brung up to be afraid of 

owls. 
Reckon that a spryer critter never tallered 

boots ; 
Alius up to monkey tricks and full o' squirms 

and scoots. 
Once he done a curis thing, I vummy, on a 

stump : 
Set a larder up one end and gin' a mighty jump ; 
Run right up the larder, jest as nimble as a 

monkey, 
Balarnced, I sh'd suttin say, a minit — all a- 

hunky ; 
Then he straddled out on air and grabbed the 

pesky larder 
And run 'er up another length ^ — another length, 

suh, f arder ; 



24 UP IN MAINE 

Skittered up that larder 'fore she had a chance 

to teeter, 
Quicker'n any pussy cat — lighter'n a mos- 

keeter. 
Soon's he clambered to the top, grabbed the 

upper rung, 
Ketched hisself with t'other hand, and there the 

critter hung. 
Gaffled up his britches' slack and took a resky 

charnce 
And thar' he held hisself right out, arms-length, 

suh, by his parnts. 
Ye ought ter heerd, my barby dear, the cheerins 

and the howls 
The crov/d let out when they'd obsarved that 

trick of Mister Cowles. 

Sing'lar thing of which I sing — might not 
think 'twas true; 
Fie, deedle, deedle, leetle ba-a-arby ! 
But ye know, my leetle snoozer, grampy wouldn't 
lie to you, 
— To his dumpy, dumpy deedle, leetle 
barby. 

Hush, I guess that mammy isn't done a-makin' 

bread, 
We ain't at all pertic'lar how she overhears 

what's said. 



GROUND HOME 25 

Ye're over-young, purraps, to hear of Sam'wel 

DoubFyei' Strout, 
-™ Weighed about two hundred pounds, and, 

chowder, warn't he stout ! 
Used to work for me one time as sort of extry 

hand, 

— Alius planned to 'gage him when I cleared up 
any land ; 

Once I see him lug a rock with fairly mod'rit 

ease 
So hefty that at ev'ry step he sunk above his 

knees. 
Hain't at all surprised to see the wonder in j^our 
eye; 
Fie, deedle, deedle, leetle ba-a-arby ! 
But ye know your poor old grampy wouldn't 
tell ye ary lie, 
— To his tumpy, dumpy deedle, leetle 
barby. 

Course ye've never heerd 'em tell of Atha-ni-al 

Prime, 
For he was round a-raisin' Cain so long afore 

your time. 
Used to run the mulej^ saw down to Hopkins 

mill, 

— Alius cuttin' ding-does up — a master curis 
pill! 



26 UP IN MAINE 

Once the chaps that tended sluice stood upon a 

log. 
Got to argyin' this and that, suthin' 'bout a dog. 

Clean forgot to start the log a-goin' up the 
sluice, 

But shook their fists and hollered round and spit 
torbarker juice. 

Atha-ni-al heerd the towse and grabbed a pick- 
pole up, 

— Wasn't goin' to stop a mill to fight about a 
pup,— 

Tied a rope around the pole and then he let her 

flam, 
Speared the end of that air log and yanked her 

quicker'n Sam. 
Log, suh, come right out the bark, he twitched 

the thing so quick ; 
Fellers never felt the yank, 'twas done so smooth 

and slick. 
Log come out and up the sluice and left behind 

the bark, 

— Fellers thought the log was there and stood 
and chawed till dark. 

Sing'lar things has come to pass when I was 
young as you ; 
Fie, deedle, deedle, leetle ba-a-arby ! 
And best of all, what grampy sings you bet your 
life is true, 
Tumpy, deedle, dumpy, leetle barby. 



'ROUND HOME 2T 

HOSKINS'S COW 

Hoskins's cow got into the pound and the notice 

was tacked on the meetin'-house door : 
" Come into my yard, one brindle cow with three 

white feet, and her shoulders sore, 
— Galled by a poke, — and the owner is asked 

to call at the pound and take her away." 
Well, Hoskins knew she was his all right, but, 

you see, he hadn't wherewith to pay. 

The cow was breaqhy — she wasn't to blame, 

for Hoskins had turned her abroad to roam ; 
She liad to battle for daily grass, for the bovine 

cupboard was bare at home. 
So Hoskins had hitched on her withered neck a 

wooden " regalia " — sort of a yoke. 
Supposed to keep her from breachy tricks, but 

the poor old creature employed the " poke " 
To rip up fences and let down bars ; her hunger 

sharpened her slender wits. 
And somehow she sneaked through the guarded 

gates, and gave the garden sass regular fits. 

The neighbors pitied her starving state, but at 
last she stubbornly wouldn't shoo ; 

They pounded tattoos on her skinny ribs till it 
really seemed they would whack 'em through. 



28 UP IN MAINE 

But she got so toughened and callous and hard, 

and the stiffened frame of her mortised bones 
Formed such an excellent armor-plate against 

the broadsides of sticks and stones, 
That they '^ pounded" her then in a different 

way — in the village pound — whose walls 

would hold 
The breachiest cow that ever strayed — and the 

notice was posted as I have told. 

She stood there a day and she stayed there a 
night; she cropped the scanty bushes and 
grass. 

And moo-ed and loo-ed in a yearning way, when- 
ever a person chanced to pass. 

— She ate the leaves from some alder sprouts 
for a scantj^ breakfast the second day. 

And munched the twigs for her dinner, alas, 
and longed, oh, so much, for some meadow 
hay. 

That night she gnawed at her drj^ old poke, — 
a painful meal, for the slivers ran 

In her tongue ; so she crouched by the high- 
barred gate and seemed deserted of God and 
man. 

And Hoskins knew that they had his cow, and 
Hoskins knew of her solemn fast, 



'ROUND HOME 29 

For he'd gone up the highway and looked 
through the gate in her dumb, reproachful eyes 
as he passed. 

Yet what, may I ask, could the poor man. do ? 
He was right in a place where he couldn't 

pay, 

— He had three dollars, 'tis true enough, and 

'twould square the bill, but, you see, that day 
The catchers had come and taken his dogs : a 

hound, a setter, and brindle-pup. 
And a man like Hoskins would ne'er endure to 

have the dog-pound gobble them up. 
For he gunned on Sundays behind the hound, 

and the bull was entered and backed to fight. 
And Hoskins, you see, as a sporting man had a 

reputation to keep upright. 
I wonder, friends, if you've ever thought, while 

you've stormed at rum as the poor man's curse, 
There are chaps so built on the mental plan that 

keeping dogs will warp them worse ? 
The ''two-dog" man may be reclaimed, but I've 

been compelled, alas, to see 
That there doesn't appear to be much hope for 

the wretched critter condemned to three. 
And Hoskins's duty was plain to him : his 

youngsters wailed for the milk they missed, 
But Hoskins thought of his poor, poor dogs and 

gripped his dollars tight in his fist. 



80 UP IN MAINE 

He shut his ears to his children's cries, he steeled 

his heart when he passed the pound, 
To the mute appeal in the old cow's eyes ; but 

he smiled at last when his dogs were found. 
And he gladly proffered the three lone plunks 

to sate the greed of the legal hogs, 
And proudly he took the highway back, a-lead- 

ing his licensed, bailed-out dogs. 
And they barked and yipped and yapped and 

yawped at a poor old tottering cow they found 
Absorbed in a desperate, hungry reach for a 

thistle outside the village pound. 



1 



'ROUND HOME 31 

AN OLD STUN' WALL 

If ye only knew the backaches in an old stun' 

wall ! 

O, Lordy me, 
I'm seventy-three ! 
— Begun amongst these boulders and I've lived 

here through it all. 
I wasn't quite to bub's age there, when dad 

commenced to clear 
The wust of ninety acres with a hoss team and 

a steer. 
And we've used the stun's for fencin' and we've 

built around the lot, 
O, I've tugged and worked there, sonny, ontil 

gracious me, I've sot 
And fairly groaned o ' evenings with the twinges 

in my back ; 
Sakes, there warn't no shirkin,' them days ; it 

was tug and lift and sack. 
For it needed lots of muscle, lots of gruntin', 

lots of sand 
If a feller calculated for to clear a piece of 

land. 
Bub, it isn't any wonder that our backs has got 

a hump. 
That our arms are stretched and awkward like 

the handle on a pump. 



32 UP IN MAINE 

That our palms are hard and calloused, that we 

wobble in our gait 
— There's the reason right before you 'round 

the medders in the State. 
And I wonder sometimes, sonny, that we've 

any backs at all 
Wlien I figer on the backaches in an 

Old 

Stun' 

Wall. 
If ye only knew the backaches in an old stun' 

wall! 

We read of men 
Who with a pen 
Have pried away the curses that have crushed 

us in their fall. 
I don't begrudge them honor nor the splendor 

of their name 
For an av'rage Yankee farmer hasn't any use 

for fame. 
But the man who lifted curses and the man 

who lifted stones 
Never'll hear a mite of diff'runce in the 

Heavenly Father's tones. 
For I have the humble notion, bub, that when 

all kinds of men. 
The chaps that pried with crowbar and the 

chaps that pried with pen, 



'ROUND HOME 33 

Are waitin' to be measured for the things 

they've done below 
The angel Avith the girth-chain's bound to give 

us all fair show. 
And the humble man who's tussled with the 

rocks of stubborn Maine 
Won't find that all his labor has been thankless 

and in vain. 
And while the wise and mighty get the glorious 

credit due 
The man who took the brunt of toil will be 

remembered too. 
The man who bent his aching back will earn 

his crown, my child, 
By the acres he made fertile and the miles of 

rocks he piled. 
That ain't my whole religion, for I don't propose 

to shirk 
What my duties are to Heaven, — but the gospel 

of hard work 
Is a mighty solid bed-rock that I've built on 

more or less ; 
I believe that God Almighty has it in his heart 

to bless 
For the good they've left behind them rough old 

chaps with humped-up backs 
Who have gone ahead and smoothed things with 

the crowbar and the axe. 



34 



UP IN MAINE 



For if all our hairs are numbered and He notes 

the sparrow's fall 
He understands the backaches in an 

Old 

Stun' 

Wall. 



'ROUND HOME 35 

THE STOCK IN THE TIE-UP 

I'm workin' this week in the wood lot ; a hearty- 
old job, you can bet ; 
I finish my chores with a larntern, and marm has 

the table all set 
By the time I get in with the milkin' ; and after 

I wash at the sink, 
And marm sets a saucer o' strainin's for the cat 

and the kittens to drink. 
Your uncle is ready for supper, with an appetite 

whet to an edge 
That'll cut like a bush-scythe in swale-grass, and 

couldn't be dulled on a ledge. 
And marm, she slats open the oven, and pulls 

out a heapin' full tin 
Of the rippin'est cream-tartar biskit a man ever 

pushed at his chin. 
We pile some more wood on the fire, and open 

the damper full blare. 
And pull up and pitch into supper — and com- 
fort — and taste good — wal, there ! 
And the wind swooshes over the chimbly, and 

scrapes at the shingles cross grain. 
But good double winders and bankin' are mighty 

good friends here in Maine. 
I look 'crost the table to mother, and marm she 

looks over at me, 



36^ UP IN MAINE 

And passes another hot biskit and says, " Won't 

3^e have some more tea ? " 
And while I am stirrhi' the sugar, I relish the 

sound of the storm. 
For, thank the good Lord, we are cosy and the 

stock in the tie-up is warm. 

I tell ye, the song o' the fire and the chirruping 

hiss o' the tea. 
The roar of the wind in the chimbly, they sound 

dreadful cheerful to me. 
But they'd harrer me, plague me, and fret me, 

unless as I set here I knew 
That the critters are munchin' their fodder and 

bedded and comf'table too. 
These biskits are light as a feather, but, boy, 

they'd be heavier'n lead 
If I thought that my bosses was shiv'rin', if I 

thought that my cattle warn't fed. 
There's men in the neighborhood 'round me who 

pray som'w'at louder than me. 
They wear better clothes, sir, on Sunday — chip 

in for the heathen Chinee, 
But the cracks in the sides o' their tie-ups are 

Avide as the door o' their pevv^, 
And the winter comes in there a-howlin', with 

the sleet and the snow peltin' through. 



*1 



'ROUND HOME 3T 

Step in there, sir, ary a mornin' and look at their 

critters ! 'Twoiild seem 
As if they were bilers or engines, and all o' 

them chock full o' steam. 
I've got an old-fashioned religion that calkalates 

Sundays for rest, 
But if there warn't time, sir, on week days to 

batten a tie-up, I'm blest 
I'd u^e up a Sunday or sucl>like, and let the 

durned heathen folks go 
While I fastened some boards on the lintel to 

keep out the frost and the snow. 
I'd stand all the frowns of the parson before I'd 

have courage to face 
The dumb holler eyes o' the critters hooked up 

in a frosty old place. 
And I'll bet ye that in the Hereafter the men 

who have stayed on their knees 
And let some poor, fuzzy old cattle stand out in 

a tie-up and freeze, 
Will find that the heat o' the Hot Place is keyed 

to an extra degree 
For the men who forgot to consider that critters 

have feelin's same's we. 

I dasn't go thinkin' o' tie-ups where winter goes 

whistlin' through. 
Where cattle are humped at their stanchions 

with scarcely the gumption to moo. 



38 UP IN MAINE 

But I'm glad for the sake of Hereafter that 

mine ain't the sin and the guilt, 
And I tell you I relish my feelin's when I pull 

up the big patchwork quilt. 
I can laugh at the pelt o' the snowflakes, and 

grin at the slat o' the storm, 
And thank the good Lord I can sleep now ; the 

stock in the tie-up is warm. 



'ROUND HOME 39 

EPHRUM WADE'S STAND-BY IN 
HAYING 

Ephrum Wade sat down in the shade 

And took off his haymaker hat, which he laid 

On a tussock of grass ; and he pulled out the 

plug 
That jealously gagged the old iron-stone jug. 
And cocking his jug on his elbow he rigged 
A sort of a "• horse-up," you know, and he 

swigged 
A pint of hard cider or so at a crack. 
And set down the jug with a satisfied smack. 
" Aha ! " said he, " that grows the hair on ye, 

bub. 
My rule durin' hayin's more cider, less grub. 
I take it, sah, wholly to stiddy my nerves, 
And up in the stow hole I pitch 'em some 

curves 
On a drink of straight cider, in harnsomer shape 
Than a feller could do on the juice of the grape. 
Some new folderinos come 'long every day, 
All sorts of new jiggers to help git yer hay. 
Improvements on cutter bars, hoss forks, and 

rakes. 
And tedders and spreaders and all of them fakes. 
But all of their patents ain't fixed it so yit 
That hayin' is done without git-up and git. 



40 UP IN MAINE 

If ye want the right stuff, sah, to take up the 

slack, 
The stuff to put buckram right inter yer back, 
The stuff that will limber and ile up yer j'ints, 
Just trot out some cider and drink it by pints. 
It ain't got no patents — it helps you make hay 
As it helped out our dads in their old-fashioned 

way. 
Molasses and ginger and water won't do, 
'Twill irrigate some, but it won't see ye through. 
And ice water '11 chill ye, and skim milk is durn 
Mean stuff any place, sah, except in a churn. 
I'm a temperate man as a general rule, 
— The man who gits bit by the adder's a fool, — 
But when it comes hayin' and folks have to strain, 
I tell you, old cider's a stand-by in Maine." 

Then Ephrum Wade reclined in the shade 
And patiently gazed on the hay while it '' made." 



'ROUND HOME 41 

RESURRECTION OF EPHRUM WAY 

Old Uncle Ephrum Isaac Way 

— He had a fit the other day. 

A sort of capiiluptic spell ; 

He hasn't been in no ways well 

Since year ago come next July ; 

He had a sunstroke ; come blamed nigh 

To passin' 'crost. And since, for him, 

The poor old man's been dretful slim. 

And 'twarn't surprisin' none, I say. 

That fit of his the other day. 

By time that Dr. Blaisdell come 

His legs and arms had growed all numb. 

He didn't sense things source at all, 

His lower jaw commenced to fall. 

And, jedged from looks, there warn't no doubt 

That Ephrum's soul was passin' out. 

Fact is, they thought that he was dead ; 

They tied the bandage round his head. 

Laid out his shroud — when first they knew, 

Eph kicked awhile and then come to ; 

Got up and stared with all his eyes, 

And said, " Why, this ain't Paradise ! 

Gol durn the luck, they let me in ; 

Now here I'm back on earth agin. 

I've been to Heaven ! I've been dead, 

I've seen it All," so Ephrum said. 



42 UP IN MAINE 

And while we gathered round with awe 

He told us all the things he saw. 

And while he yarned that tale of Death 

The parson came, all out of breath, 

Exclaiming o'er and o'er again, 

'' A vision ! Wondrous ! Blest of men ! " 

And asked, " Oh, tell us, Mr. Way, 

How long were you allowed to stay ? " 

And then the crowd hung breathless round 

A-harkin' until Ephrum found 

Some sort of language in his reach, 

* — For he was sort of dull in speech. 

" Wal, friends," he slowly said at last, 

" I ricoUect that when I passed 

The pearly gates and sills of gold 

And see that blessed sight unfold 

Before my dim old hazy eyes, 

I got a shock of such surprise 

I couldn't move, — I couldn't speak, 

— Jest run my tongue down in my cheek 
And sort of numbly pronged and pried 
The chaw I took before I died. 

— That's been my habit all my days ; 
When I am nervous anyways 

I don't fly all to gosh. Instid 
I simply, calmly shift my quid. 
But jest as I had rolled her 'crost - — 
Wal, suthin' dropped and I was lost. 



'ROUND HOME 43 

And all of Heaven, friends, I saw 

Was while I shifted that air chaw." 

I think, dear sir, I scarce need add 

That seldom do you see so glad 

A resurrection time as they 

Who stood there gave old Ephrum Way. 

The parson first he tried to screw 

His face up solemn, but that crew 

Broke out and howled like they was daft. 

And so he laughed and laughed and laughed. 



44 UP IN MAINE 

LOOK OUT FOR YOUR THUMB 

Hindsight is clearer than foresight, 

Bnt foresight is better and safer, old chap. 

Experiment teaches, but common sense reaches 
And tests the bright baubles in Dame Future's 
lap. 

I'm telling you what Eph Landers did 
The time that the critter lost his fid. 

He was sort of a quick, impulsive man ; 
— When others walked, he always ran. 

He never waited to calmly view^. 

But he got right up and slam-banged through. 

Believed that the moments a feller took * 

To give the future a good square look 

Was simply so much wasted time ; 

His plan was, " Never look up ; just climb." 

He was yankin' boulders a weiBk ago 
And things got balk}^ and movin' slow. 

He strung the chain 'round a good big rock 
And found that he'd lost the little block 



'ROUND HOME 45 

To catch the link ; it's used instid 

Of a hook and link, and it's called a fid. 

And Eph, he held the unhooked chain 

By the ends, and he looked and ,he got profane. 

But he couldn't find it and wouldn't wait, 
— He was mad as a bug and desperate. 

And the crack-brained critter — what do ye 

think ? 
Why, he stuck his thumb in the unhooked link. 

He didn't consider that 'twarn't his fid, 
But the oxen started — and then he did ! 

He see'd his mistake, as most men do, 

When the deed is done and the thing is through : 

You stick your thumb where it don't belong 
And the world will yank it, good and strong. 

Hindsight is clearer than foresight^ 

But you^d better ask foresight to give ye a 

point ; 
Or^ first thing you're knowi7i\ Old World will be 

goin\ 
And he^ll laugh while you howl with your thumb 

out of joint. 



46 UP IN MAINE 

THE TRIUMPH OF MODEST MARIA 

Maria's comb hung lopsy-wise 
And flapped athwart her filmy eyes, 
Exactly like a slattern's hair 
On washing day ; and I declare 
She was the slouchiest-looking hen 
That pecked in T. B. Tucker's pen. 

Cah-dah! Cah-dut! 

She was the butt 
Of every sort of jibe and cut. 

Maria was a Brahma dame, 

Broad and squat and plucked and lame. 

The Leghorns cast a pitying smile 

Upon her queer, old-fashioned style. 

The Plymouth Rocks would jeer and flout 

Because her legs were feathered out. 

The cocks would strut, 

Pah-rutt ! Pah-rutt ! 
And snigger at her bloomers' cut. 

The trim white Cochins tip-toed by 

And froze her with disdainful eye ; 

Each tufted Houdan tossed her plume 

And glared Maria's social doom. J 

Where'er she strolled in all the yard 

Maria got it good and hard ! 



'ROUND HOME 4T 

Cah-dut! Cah-dah! 
Each social star 
Just dropped Maria with a jar. 

But she pursued her quiet way, 

And picked and scratched the livelong day, 

Kept early hours and ate bran mash, 

Nor sought to cut a social dash. 

And then one day she left her nest 

With pallid comb and swelling breast. 

Cah-dut! Cah-dah! 

Hooray, hurrah ! 
Maria, you're a queen, you are ! 

The news went cackling round the pen 

— An egg I It measured twelve by ten. 

And T. B. Tucker drove to town 

To take that gor-rammed big egg down. 

The editor put on his specs. 

The villagers turned rubber necks. 

And some collecting feller paid 

Right smart for what Maria laid. 

And European news was set 

Aside that week by the Grazette 

In order that a glowing pen 

Might pay due praise to that old hen. 

Cah-lip ! Cah-lop ! 

You'll find, sure pop. 
That modest merit lands on top. 



48 UP IN MAINE 

SON HAS GOT THE DEED 

Mother fights with Marshy, and Marshy fights 
with her, 

— Don't give up yer proputty, I'm tellin' on yer, 
sir! 

Don't give up yer proputty to nary blessed one, 

— Don't keer whuther brother, sir, or nephy, 
sir, or son. 

Don't make over northin', sir, ontil you're done 

and through. 
Or ye'll cuss the day ye done it till the air is 

black and blue. 
Me and marm got feeble and we couldn't run 

the farm. 
Son was newly married and we couldn't see the 

harm 
In makin' on it over, we to have the ell and shed. 
Use the sittin' room in common — and a room 

for one spare bed. 
And so we made the papers and we signed ^em, 

me and wife, 
'Lowin' them the stand and stock, and us our 

keep for life. 
Twelvemonth isn't finished, but the trouble has 

begun. 
An' it's one continyal rowin' 'twixt us and her 

and son. 



'ROUND HOME 49 

Marshy dings at mother and mother dings at her, 
T things ain't settled somehow, sir, they'll git 
to clawin' fur. 

Don't give up yer proputty, I'm tellin' on ye 

straight. 
Don't keer who your family is, ye'll rue it sure 

as fate. 
'Fore ye sign the papers they'll come round ye 

slicker'n cream, 
But ye'll notice little later, sir, that things ain't 

what they seem. 
Man that's got his proputty, he's looked to with 

respect ; 
Relations they come meechin' round to 

scratch, sir, where he's pecked. 
Ye see, he rules the family roost and leads the 

family flock. 
As proud and full of manners as a Cochin China 

cock. 
But if the years have loosened up his intellect 

and grip. 
And if he thinks his folks are straight, and lets 

the old farm slip. 
He'll find the grin becomes a frown and sweet- 
ness turns to greed. 
For folks see things in different light when once 

they've got a deed. 



50 UP IN MAINE 

Now Marshy snarls at mother and mother sends 

it back, 
And all the time, from sun to sun, it's clack and 

clack and clack ! 

Don't give up yer propputy, hang on till death, 

I say; 
It's time when you are done with it to give your 

all away. 
Oh, how the devil snickers round when some 

old codger drools 
About "the laying down of cares " — and jines 

the ranks of fools ! 
And how the lawyers laugh and joke, and how 

the angels weep. 
To see some old folks deed away their farm for 

board and keep ! 
— Never see'd no better cook than Marshy 

used to be, 
When first along she'd ask us down to dinner 

or to tea. 
Used to sweeten grub with smiles when she 

would pass a plate. 
And me and marm, like two old coots, we swal- 
lowed hook and bait. 
You bet we git some diff 'rent looks, we git some 

different feed, 



'ROUND HOME 51 

Jest like they'd throw it out to dogs, now son 

has got the deed. 
An' Marshy growls at mother, and mother's 

growlin' wuss. 
An' I — wal, I jest set and smoke and cuss — 

and cuss — and cuss ! 



62 UP IN MAINE 

AN IDYL OF COLD WEATHER 

When all the sky seems blazing down, and sun- 
shine curls the bricks, 
And General Humidity puts in his biggest licks, 
I welcome to my eyry, with a moist and dripping 

palm, 
A placid old philosopher who runs a little farm. 
Who says imagination helps a deal in keeping 

cool, 
And who to comfort other men makes this his 

simple rule : 
To talk of piping, biting days, and drifting 

winter storm 
Whene'er the weather pipes it up and gets too 

thunderin' warm. 
They're better far than fizz or smash or juleps, 

sure's vou're born, 
— The honest little narratives of Frigid Weather 

John. 
For though the sizzling summer time may boil 

and steam and hiss. 
Who'd ever, ever think of it while listening to 

this ? 

" I never see'd a winter have a durnder, sharper 

aidge 
Than in the year of Sixty-one, the year that I 

drove stage. 



'ROUND HOME 53 

I never had so hard a job attendin' to my biz, 
For everything 't was frizable, that year yon bet 

was friz. 
At last I done a caper that I hadn't done for 

years : 
I got a little careless and I friz up both my ears. 
The roads was awful drifted and I trod ten 

miles of snow, 
And all the time that zippin' wind did nothin', 

sah, but blow. 
Them ears of mine was froze so hard, stuck out 

so bloomin' straight, 
I thought the wind would snap 'em off, it blew 

at such a rate. 
And when at last I hauled up home, the missus 

bust in tears 
And hollered, ' John, oh, massy me, you're going 

to lose your ears.' 
But I — why, land o' goodness, I was cooler'n I 

be now," 
— And he passed his red bandanna up across 

his steaming brow, — 
'' I jest got out my hatchet and I chopped two 

cakes of ice 
And held 'em on my friz-up ears — 'twas 

Granpy Jones' advice. 
I didn't dast go in the house, but set there in 

the shed 



54 UP IN MAINE 

A-holdin' them two chunks of ice to either 

side my head. 
The chunks weighed fifty pounds apiece — that 

doctorin' didn't cost — 
And so I got 'em big enough to take out all the 

frost. 
My wife came out at last to see what made me 

keep so still, 
And there I was, sali, sound asleep and snorin' 

fit to kill. 
She got me in and gave me tea and helped me 

inter bed. 
With that 'ere ice a-frozen tight and solid to my 

head. 
'Twas sort of curi's, I confess, but still I slept 

complete, 
A crystal palace on my head and soapstones on 

my feet. 
It wasn't really what you'd call a calm and rest- 
ful night. 
But when the ice peeled off next day them ears 

come out all right." 

They're better far than fizz or smash or juleps, 

sure's you're born, 
— These honest little narratives from Frigid 

Weather John. 



GROUND HOME 55 

BUSTED THE "TEST YOUR STRENGTH " 

When pa was down to Topsliam fair 
I snooped around and heard him swear 
To Jotham Briggs that it seemed to him 
That muscle nowadays was slim, 
For he said he'd stood there quite a length, 
Seein' folks whang at the " test your strength," 
And there wasn't a one in all that spell 
Who'd hit a crack that had tapped the bell. 
And pa talked loud and he sassed the crowd, 
And the crowd sassed pa, and he allowed 
He'd show 'em what ; and so old Jote 
Just held his hat and his vest and coat ; 
And pa he rolled his sleeves up tight, 
Hauled out his plug and took a bite. 
He whirled one arm in wind-mill style, 

— Then whirled the other one awhile. 
He picked his pessle out at length 

And sassed the great, tall " test your strength." 
" I'm goin' to soak ye now," says pa, 
'^ You'll think it's y'earthquakes by the jar. 
Git out the way and giv' me swing, 

— I'll bust the ha'slet out the thing." 
And pa he spit in both his fists 

And give the handle two tkree twists, 
And swung the beetle round and round 
To give one big, gol-rippin' pound. 



56 UP IN MAINE 

One knee was right up 'ginst his chin, 

His eyes stuck out, his lips sucked in, 

And down he fetched her with a jolt. 

But pa — but pa — he missed his holt ! 

He lost his grip, the pessle flew, 

And folks they scattered, I tell you. 

Some chaps fell down and some they ducked. 

And them fur off, by gosh, they hucked. 

For that air pessle, sir, it come 

Sky-hootin' like a ten-inch bumb. 

It landed more'n eight rods away 

Right through the top of Drew's new shay, 

— Right 'twixt the gal and Ezry Drew, 
And huUy gee, it scart 'em blue. 
While pa — wal, pa, he jest turned green 

— Gawked fust at Drew, then that machine. 
And hammed and stuttered out at length, 

" I aimed 'er at that ' test your strength ' ! " 
" Good eye ! " says Ez, as mad as sin, 
And then he snorted, " Drunk agin ! " 
And pa — wal, warn't a thing to say, 
'Cept pull, — and ask Ez, " What's to pay ? " 



'ROUND HOME 57 

"WHEN A MAN GETS OLD" 

The clash and the clatter of mowing-machines 
Float up where the old man stands and leans 
His trembling hands on the worn old snath, 
As he looks afar in the broadening path, 
Where the shivering grasses melt beneath 
A seven-foot bar and its chattering teeth. 



When a man gits old, says he. 

When a man gits old, 
He is mighty small pettaters 
As I've just been told. 
I used to mow at the head of the crew, 
And I cut a swath that was wide as two. 

— Covered a yard, sah, at every sweep ; 
The man that foUered me had to leap. 

I made the best of the critters squeal, 
And nary a feller could nick my heel. 
The crowd that follered, they took my road 
As I walked away from the best that mowed. 
But I can't keep up with the boys no more, 
My arms are stiff and my cords are sore : 
And they've given this rusty scythe to me 

— It has hung two years in an apple-tree — 
And told me to trim along the edge 

Where the mowing-machine has skipped the 
ledge. 



58 UP IN MAINE 

It seems, sah, sknrcely a year ago 
That I was a-showin' 'em how to mow, 
A-showin' 'em how, with the tanglin' grass 
Topplin' and fallin', to let me pass ; 
A-showing 'em how, with a five-foot steel, 
And never a man who could nick my heel. 
But now it's the day of the hot young blood, 
And I'm doin' the job of the fuddy-dud ; 
Hacking the sides of the dusty road 
And the corner clumps where the men ain't 

mowed. 
And that's the way, a man gits told, 
He's smaller pettaters when he grows old. 



'ROUND HOME 59 

I'VE GOT THEM CALVES TO VEAL 

It's a jolly sort of season, is the spring — is the 

spring, 
And there isn't any reason for not feeling like a 

king. 
The sun has got flirtatious and he kisses Mis- 
tress Maine, 
And she pouts her lips, a-saying, " Mister, can't 

you come again ? " 
The hens are all a4aying, the potatoes sprouting 

well. 
And fodder spent so nicely that I'll have some 

hay to sell. 
But when I get to feeling just as well as I can feel. 
All to once it comes across me that I've got 

them calves to veal. 

Oh ! I can't go in the stanchion, look them 

mothers in the eye. 
For I'm meditatin' murder ; planning how their 

calves must die. 
Every time them little shavers grab a teat, it 

wrings my heart, 
— Hate to see 'em all so happy, for them cows 

and calves must part. 
That's the reason I'm so mournful ; that's the 

'reason in the spring 



60 UP IN MAINE 

I go feeling just like Nero or some other wicked 

thing, 
For I have to slash and slaughter ; have to set 

an iron heel 
On the feelings of them mothers ; I have got 

them calves to veal. 

Spring is happy for the poet and the lover and 

the girl, 
But the farmer has to do things that will make 

his harslet curl. 
And the thing that hits me hardest is to stand 

the lonesome moos 
Of that stanchion full of critters when they find 

they're going to lose 
Little Spark-face, Little Brindle — when the 

time has come to part. 
And the calves go off a-blatting in a butcher's 

rattling cart. 
Though the cash the butcher pays me sort of 

smooths things up and salves 
All the really rawest feeling when I sell them 

little calves. 
Still I'm mournful in the springtime; knocks 

me off my even keel, 
Seeing suffering around me when I have them 

calves to veal. 



'ROUND HOME 61 

THE OFF SIDE OF THE COW 

Old Wendell Hopkins' hired man is an absent- 
minded chap, 

He'll start for a chair, and like as not set down 
in some one's lap. 

I happened along where he stopped to bait his 
bosses the other day, 

— He'd given the bosses his luncheon pail and 
was trying to eat their hay, 

— A kind of a blame fool sort of a trick for even 
a hired man. 

But he tackled a different kind of a snag when 
he fooled with Matilda Ann, 

— When he fooled with Matilda Ann, by jinks, 
he got it square in the neck. 

And the doctors say, though live he may, he's a 
total human wreck. 

He's wrapped in batting and thinking now 
Of the grief in insulting a brindle cow. 

Matilda Ann gives down her milk and she 

doesn't switch her tail ; 
She gives ten quarts — week in, week out, and 

she never kicks the pail. 
She doesn't hook and she doesn't jump, but even 

Matilda Ann 
Ain't called to stand all sorts of grief from a 

dern fool hired man. 



62 UP IN MAINE 

And when he stubbed to the milking-shed in 

sort of a dream and tried 
To make Matilda " So " and " Whoa " while he 

milked on the wrong, off side, 
She giv' him a look to wilt his soul and pugged 

him once with her hoof. 
And I guess that at last his wits were jogged as 

he slammed through the lintel roof. 
He's got a poultice on his brow 
Of the size of the foot of a brindle cow. 

Now study the ways of the world, my son ; oh, 

study the ways of life ! 
It's the hustling chap that gets the cash, or the 

girl he wants for a wife ; 
It's the feller that spots the place to grab, when 

Chance goes swinging by, 
Who gets his dab in the juiciest place and the 

biggest plum in the pie ; 
There's always a chance to milk the world — 

there's a teat, a pail, and a stool ; 
There's a place for the chap with sense and grip, 

but a dangerous holt for a fool. 
For while the feller that's up to snuff drums a 

merry tune in his pail,'^ 
The fool sneaks up on the left-hand side and 

lands in the grave or in jail. 

— It's an awkard place, as you'll allow. 
The off-hand side of the world or a cow. 



ROUND HOME 63 

THE LYRIC OF THE BUCK-SAW 

Ur-r rick, ur-r raAV, 
Ur-r rick, ur-r raw ! 
Have you buckled your back to an old buck-saw ? 
Have you doubled your knee on a knotty stick 
And bobbed to the tune of ur-r raw, ur-r rick? 
Have you sawed till your eye-balls goggled and 

popped, 
Till your heart seemed lead and your breath was 

stopped ? 
Have you yeaked her up and yawked her down, 
— As doleful a lad as there was in town ? 
If so, we can talk of the back-bent woe 
That followed the youngsters of long ago. 
Ah, urban chap, with your anthracite. 
Pass on, for you cannot fathom, quite. 
The talk that I make wdth this other chap 
Who got no cuddling in Comfort's lap. 
You'll scarcely follow me when I sing 
Of the rasping buck-saw's dancing spring. 
For the rugged rhythm is fashioned for 
The ear that remembers ur-r rick, ur-r raw. 

Ur-r raw, ur-r rick. 

Ur-r raw, ur-r rick ! 
We pecked at our mountain stick by stick. 
Our dad was a man who was mighty good 
In getting the women-folks lots of wood. 



64 UP IN MAINE 

And as soon as sledding came on to stay- 
Jack got all work and he got no play. 
For daily the ox-sleds creaked and crawked 
Till the yard was full and the buck-saws talked. 
'Twas rugged toil and we humped our backs, 
But we scarce kept pace with dad's big axe. 
There were bitter mornings of " ten below," 
There were days of bluster and days of snow, 
But with double mittens, a big wool scarf. 
And coon-skin ear-laps, we used to laugh 
At the fussiest blast old Boreas shrieked, 
And the nippingest pinches Jack Frost tweaked, 
We were warm as the blade of the yanking saw 
That steamed to the tune of ur-r rick, ur-r raw ! 

Ur-r raw, ur-r rick, 

Ur-r raw, ur-r rick ! 
Ho, men at the desks, there, dull and sick ! 
You slap your hands to your stiff old backs 
At thought of the days of the saw and axe ; 
And you press your palms to an aching brow, 
And shiver to think of a saw-buck now. 
But ah, old fellows, you can't deny 
You hanker a bit for the times gone by. 
When the toil of the tasks that filled the day 
Made bright by contrast our bits of play. 
Oh, grateful the hour at set of sun. 
When the tea was hot, and the biscuits " done; " 



'ROUND HOME 65 

When chocking his axe in the chopping-block, 
Dad sung, '' Knock off, boys, five o'clock." 
Now tell me truly, ye wearied men. 
Are you ever as happy as you were then. 
When you straightened your toil-bent, weary 

backs 
At the welcome plop of dad's old axe ? 
And tell me truly, can you forget 
The sight of the table that mother set, 
When dropping the saws in the twilight gloom. 
We trooped to the cheer of the dear fore-room. 
And there in the red shade's mellow light 
Made feast with a grand good appetite ? 

— Made feast at the sweet old homespun board 
On the plum preserves and the " crab jell " stored 
For demands like these ; and made great holes 
In the heaps of the cream o' tartar rolls ? 

Ah, gusto ! fickle and faint above 
The savory viands you used to love. 
What wouldn't you give for the sharp-set tang 
That followed those days when the steel teeth 
sang ? 

— For zest was as keen as the bright, swift saw 
When you humped to the tune of ur-r rick, 

ur-r raw ? 



66 UP IN MAINE 

MISTER KEAZLE'S EPITAPH 

Foster the tinker traversed Maine 

From Elkinstown to Kittery Point, 
With a rattling pack and a rattling brain, 

And a general air oi " out of joint." 
A gaunt old chap with a shambling gait, 

A battered hat, and rusty clothes, 
With grimy digits in sorry state. 

And a smooch on the end of his big red nose. 
That was the way that Foster went, 

— Mixture of shrewdness and folly blent, 
Mending the pots and the pans as ordered, 
But leaving the leak in his nob unsoldered. 

But Foster the tinker was no one's fool ; 

He fired an answer every time. 
'Twas either a saw or proverb or rule. 
Or else a bit of home-made rhyme. 
And while he knocked at a pot or a pan 

And puffed the coals of his little blaze, 
He was ready and primed for^the jocose man 
Who thought that the tinker was easy to 
phase. 
It chanced that Foster stopped one night 
With a man who thought a master sight 
Of being esteemed as smart's a weasel 

— Man by the name of Obed Keazle. 



GROUND HOME 67 

And he pronged at Foster the evening through 
While the folks were having a merry laugh ; 
And they laughed the most when he said, '' Now 
you 
Compose me a good nice epitaph, 
And your lodging here shan't cost a cent." 
So Foster snapped at the chance and said 
He would have it ready before he went, 

And would make one verse ere they went to 
bed. 
So Keazle listened with deep delight 
While he heard the guileless chap recite, 
With his head a-cock like a huge canary, 
This sample of his obituary : 
Thus he begun 
Verse number one : 

" A man there was who died of late. 
Whom angels did impatient wait, 
With outstretched arms and smiles of love 
To bear him to the Realms Above.'' 

Foster the tinker slept that night 

On a feather tick that was three feet thick, 
And Keazle attended in calm delight 

To warm the bed with a nice hot brick. 
And the tinker sat at the breakfast board 

And blandly smiled and ate and ate, 



68 UP IN MAINE 

Then piled on his back his motley hoard 
And took his stand at the front yard gate. 
He said, " I'll give ye the other half 
Of that strictly fust-class epitaph." 
There are doubts you know as to how it 

suited, 
But the tinker didn't wait — he scooted. 
For thus ran — whew ! 
Verse number two : 

"While angels hovered in the skies 
Disputing who should bear the prize, 
In slipped the devil like a weasel 
And Down Below he kicked old Keazle." 



i 



'ROUND HOME 69 

PLAIN OLD KITCHEN CHAP 

Mother's furnished up the parlor — got a full, 

new haircloth set, 
And there ain't a neater parlor in the county, 

now, I'll bet. 
She has been a-hoarding pennies for a mighty 

tedious time ; 
She has had the chicken money, and she's saved 

it, everj^ dime. 
And she's put it out in pictures and in easy 

chairs and rugs, 
— Got the neighbors all a-sniffin' 'cause we're 

puttin' on such lugs. 
Got up curtains round the winders, whiter'n 

snow and all of lace. 
Fixed that parlor till, by gracious, I should never 

know the place. 
And she says as soon's it's settled she shall give 

a yaller tea. 
And invite the whole caboodle of the neighbors 

in to see. 
Can't own up that I approve it ; seems too much 

like fubb and fuss 
To a man who's lived as I have — jest a blamed 

old kitchen cuss. 



70 UP IN MAINE 

Course we've had a front room always ; tidy place 

enough, I guess, 
Couldn't tell, I never set there, never opened it 

unless 
Parson called, or sometimes mother give a party 

or a bee, 
When the women come and quilted and the men 

dropped round to tea. 
Now we're goin' to use it common. Mother 

says it's time to start. 
If we're any better'n heathens, so's to sweeten 

life with art. 
Says I've grubbed too long with plain things, 

haven't lifted up my soul. 
Says I've denned there in the kitchen like a 

woodchuck in his hole. 
— It's along with other notions mother's getting 

from the club ; 
But I've got no growl a-comin', mother ain't let 

up on grub ! 
Still I'm wishin' she would let me have my 

smoke and take my nap 
In the corner, side the woodbox ; I'm a plain old 

kitchen chap. 

I have done my stent at f armin' ; folks will tell 

you I'm no shirk ; 
There's the callus on them fingers, that's the 

badge of honest work. 



'ROUND HOME 71 

And them hours in the corner when I've stum- 
bled home to rest 
Have been earnt by honest labor and they've 

been my very best. 
Land ! If I could have a palace wouldn't ask no 

better nook 
Than this corner in the kitchen with my pipe 

and some good book. 
I'm a sort of dull old codger, clear behind the 

times, I s'pose ; 
Stay at home and mind my bus'ness ; wear some 

pretty rusty clothes ; 
'Druther set out here'n the kitchen, have for 

forty years or more, 
Till the heel of that old rocker's gouged a holler 

in the floor ; 
Set my boots behind the cook stove, dry my old 

blue woolen socks. 
Get my knife and plug tobacker from that dented 

old tin box. 
Set and smoke and look at mother clearing up 

the things from tea ; 
— Rather tame for city fellers, but that's fun 

enough for me. 
I am proud of mother's parlor, but I'm feared 

the thing has put 
Curi's notions %n her noddle, for she says I'm 

underfoot ; 



72 UP IN MAINE 

Thinks we oughter light the parlor, get a crowd 

and ontertain, 
But I ain't no city loafer, — I'm a farmer down in 

Maine. 
Course I can't hurt mother's feelin's, wouldn't 

do it for a mint, 
Yet that parlor business sticks me, and I guess 

I'll have to hint 
That I ain't an ontertainer, and I'll leave that 

job to son ; 
I'll set out here in the kitchen while the folks 

are having fun. 
And if marm comes out to get me, I will pull 

her on my lap. 
And she'll know — and she'll forgive me, for I'm 

jest a kitchen chap. 



'ROUND HOME 73 

TAKIN' COMFORT 

I wouldn't be an emp'ror after supper's cleared 
away ; 
I wouldn't be a king, suh, if I could. 
So long as I've got health and strength, a home 
where I can stay, 
And a woodshed full of dry and fitted wood. 
For Jimmy brings the bootjack, and mother trims 

the light, 
And pulls the roller curtains, shettin' out the 

stormy night. 
And me and Jim and mother and the cat set 
down — 
Oh, who in tunket hankers for a crown ? 

Who wants to spend their ev'nin's sittin' 
starched and prim and straight, 
A-warmin' royal velvet on a throne ? 
It's mighty tedious bus'ness settin' up so 
thund'rin' late. 
With not a minit's time to call your own. 
I'd rather take my comfort after workin' through 

the days 
With my old blue woolen stockin's nigh the 

fire's social blaze. 
For me and Jim and mother and the old gray cat 
Come mighty near to knowin' where we're at. 



74 UP IN MAINE 

EPHRUM KEPT THREE DOGS 

Ephrnm Eels he had to scratch durned hard to 
keep ahead, 

— But he always kept three dogs. 

He couldn't keep a dollar bill to save his life, 
they said, 

— But he always kept three dogs. 

He said he might have been some one if he'd 

had half a chance, 
But getting grub from day to day giv' Ephrum 

such a dance. 
He never got where he could shed the patches 

off his pants ; 

— But he always kept three dogs. 

Ephrum's young ones never looked as though 
they was half-fed, 

— But he always kept three dogs. 

The house would be so cold his folks would 
have to go to bed ; 

— But Ephrum kept three dogs. 

One was sort of setter dog and two of 'em was 

houn's. 
Their skins was full of Satan ; they was always 

on their roun's, 
Till people durned their pictures in half a dozen 

towns, 

— But Ephrum kept his dogs. 



'ROUND HOME 75 

They 'bated Ephrum's poll-tax 'cause he was too 
poor to pay, 

— But Ephrum kept his dogs. 

How he scraped up cash to license 'em it ain't 
in me to say, 

— But I know he kept his dogs. 

And when a suff'rin' neighbor ambuscaded 'em, 

Eph swore — 
Then in a kind of homesick way he hustled 

round for more ; 
He struck a lucky bargain and, by thunder, he 

bought four ! 

— Jest kept on a-keepin' dogs. 



76 UP IN MAINE 

LAY OF DRIED-APPLE PIE 

Sunning themselves on the southern porch, 
Where the warm fall rays from the towering 

torch 
Of the great sun flash in the glowing noons, 
The drying apples, in long festoons. 
Drink the breath of the crisp fall days. 
Borrow the blush of the warming rays ; 
Storing their sweetness, their rich bouquet, 
Against that savage and wintry day 
When the housewife's fingers shall by and by 
Mould them into dried-apple pie. 

There they mellow and there they brown, 
Homely enough to a man from town. 
Merely strings of some shrunken fruit. 
Swung in the sun. And yet they're mute 
Memory-ticklers to those who know 
The ways of the farm in the long-ago : 
— The kitchen table, the heaping store 
Of round, red apples upon the floor. 
The purr of the parer, the mellow snip 
As the busy knives thro' the apples slip. 
The merry chatter of boys and girls. 
The rosy clutter of paring curls. 
As hurrying knives and fingers fly 
O'er the luscious fruit for dried-apple pie. 



•I 



'ROUND HOME 7T 

I'm idly thinking it sure must be 

That the rollicking sport of the apple-bee, 

— The sweetness of smiles, the touch of the 
white 

Hands flashing there in the candle-light, — 

Must all in a mystic way be blent 

In one grand flavor; — that such was lent 

To those mellowing strings, those festoons dun 

Swinging there in the late fall sun. 

For lo, as I look I seem to see 

A dream of the past, a fantasy, 

— A laughing, black-eyed roguish girl 
Whirling a writhing paring curl ; 
Chanting the words of the old mock spell 
That all we children knew so well : 

'' Three times round and down you go ! 
Now who is the one that loves me so ? " 

. . . Merely a fancy, a passing gleam 
Of the old, old days ; — a sudden dream 
Beguiled by some prank of a blurring eye 
And the tricking song of a big, blue fly ; 

— Merely a fancy, and yet, ah me. 

How often I've wondered where she can be. 



There they mellow and there they brown, 
Homely objects to folks from town ; 
Only some apples hung to dry 
And doomed to be finally tombed in a pie. 



78 UP IN MAINE 

ONLY HELD HIS OWN 

Now there's Hezekiali Adams — nicest man you 

ever saw ! 
Never had a row with no one ; never once got 

into law ; 
Always worked like thunderation, but to save 

his blessed life 
Never seemed to get forehanded — and I've laid 

it to his wife, 
For she always kept him meechin' ; calls him 

down with sour tone, 
Till the critter hasn't gumption for to say his 

soul's his own. 
T'other day 

Happened to ride along his way ; 
Heseki', 

Like a gingham rag hung out to dry, 
Peak-ed and pale, 

Lopped on the gate 'cross the upper rail. 
''Howdy!" says I, 
" Blamed if I know," says Heseki'. 
" Don't feel sick. 

But marm's kept my back on a big hot brick 
Till I can't tell 

Whuther I'm ailin' or whuther I'm well." 
" Think," says I, 
" It's too early to hoe when the ground's so dry? " 



I 



'ROUND HOME 79 

Seijs he, " 'Bout all 

I'm sartin' of is, I shall dig come fall." 

Says I, " Things look 

Like we farmers can fatten the pocket-book/' 

" Mebbe," says he, 

"- But marm vows there ain't much she can see." 

'' Ye can't jest crawl," 

Says I, '^but there's money for folks with 

sprawl." 
Old Hezekiah shifted legs and give a lonesome 

groan ; 
" I begun with these two hands," said he, 
" And I've only held my own." 

He has always worked like blazes, butr has 

always seemed to fail ; 
— Made his grabs at prancin' Fortune, but has 

caught the critter's tail ; 
Never jumped and gripped the bridle — wouldn't 

darst to on his life ; 
Always acts too blasted meechin' — and I've laid 

it to his wife. 



80 UP IN MAINE 

GRAMPY SINGS A SONG 

Row-diddy, dow de, my little sis, 
Hush up your teasin' and listen to this : 
'Tain't much of a jingle, 'tain't much of a tune. 
But it's spang-fixed truth about Chester Cahoon. 

The thund'rinest fireman Lord ever made 
Was Chester Cahoon of the Tuttsville Brigade. 
He was boss of the tub and the foreman of hose ; 
When the 'larm rung he'd start, sis, a-sheddin' 
his clothes, 

— Slung cote and slung wes'cote and kicked off 
his shoes, 

A-runnin' like fun, for he'd no time to lose. 
And he'd howl down the ro'd in a big cloud of 

dust, 
For he made it his brag he was alius there fust. 

— Alius there fust, with a whoop and a shout, 
And he never shut up till the fire was out. 
And he'd knock out the winders and save all the 

doors. 
And tear off the clapboards, and rip up the 

floors. 
For he alius allowed 'twas a tarnation sin 
To 'low 'em to burn, for you'd want 'em agin. 
He gen'rally stirred up the most of his touse 
In hustling to save the outside of the house. 



'ROUND HOME 81 

And after he'd wrassled and hollered and pried, 
He'd let up and tackle the stuff 'twas inside. 
To see him you'd think he was daft as a loon, 
But that was jest habit with Chester Cahoon. 

Row diddy-iddy, my little sis, 

Now see what ye think of a doin' like this : 

The time of the fire at Jenkins' old place 

It got a big start — was a desprit case ; 

The fambly they didn't know which way to turn. 

And by gracious, it looked like it all was to burn. 

But Chester Cahoon — oh, that Chester Cahoon, 

He sailed to the roof like a reg'lar balloon ; 

Donno how he done it, but done it he did, 

— Went down through the scuttle and shet 

down the lid. 
And five minutes later that critter he came 
To the second floor winder surrounded by 

flame. 
He lugged in his arms, sis, a stove and a bed. 
And balanced a bureau right square on his head. 
His hands they was loaded with crockery stuff, 
China and glass ; as if that warn't enough. 
He'd rolls of big quilts round his neck like a 

wreath. 
And carried Mis' Jenkins' old aunt with his 

teeth. 



82 UP IN MAINE 

You're right — gospel right, little sis, — didn't 

seem 
The critter'd git down, but he called for the 

stream. 
And when it comes strong and big round as my 

wrist 
He stuck out his legs, sis, and give 'em a 

twist ; 
And he hooked round the water jes' if 'twas a 

rope 
And down he come easin' himself on the slope, 
— So almighty spry that he made that 'ere 

stream 
As fit for his pupp'us' as if 'twas a beam. 
Oh, the thund'rinest fireman Lord ever made 
Was Chester Gaboon of the Tuttsville Brigade. 



'ROUND HOME 83 

UNCLE MICAJAH STROUT 

Guess that more'n a dozen lawyers, off and on, 

from time to time, 
Tried to settle down in Hudson, but they 

couldn't earn a dime. 
Never got a speck of business, never had a single 

case. 
Said they never in their travels struck so 

blummed-blammed funny place. 
People did a lot of hustling, town was flourish- 
ing enough, 
— Everybody but the lawyers had his fingers 

full of stuff. 
Lawyers stayed till they got hungry, then they'd 

pull their shingles down 
And go tearing off to somewhere, damning right 

and left the town. 
Told the lawyers round the county, " Hudson's 

bound to starve you out 
Till some patriot up and poisons one old cuss 
down there named Strout. 
'Cause they won't fork up a fee. 
Long's he's round to referee. 
'Case of difference or doubt 
Folks say, ' Wal, we'll leave her out 
To Uncle Micajah Strout.' " 



84 UP IN MAINE 

If a farmer bought a heifer and she didn't run 

to milk, 
If a dickerer in horse trades struck a snag or 

tried to bilk, 
If two parties got to haggling over what a farm 

was worth, 
Or if breeders split in squabbling over weight or 

age or girth ; 
If a stubborn line-fence quarrel, right-of-way dis- 
pute, or deed. 
Claim of heirship or of debtor, honest error, 

biassed greed, 
Eose to foster litigation, no one scurried to the law, 
No one belched out objurgations, sputtered oaths, 

or threatened war, 
For there was a ready resource in a certain plain 

old gent, 
Unassuming, blunt, and honest. When he said 

a thing it went. 
So there was no chance for wrangle, disputations, 

snarls, or fray. 
When the people of the village universally could 
say, 
" Oh, what's the use to fuss ? 
We shall only make a muss. 
We can fix it in about 
Half a minute. Leave it out 
To Uncle Micajah Strout." 



'ROUND HOME 85 

So no wonder all the lawyers banned and cursed 

the place, and left ; 
For contention was but fleeting and the town 

was never cleft 
By a quarrel or dissension. Rows were always 

settled young 
By the pacifying magic of Micajah's ready 

tongue. 
When at last his days were ended and he passed 

— well, now you bet 

That he had the biggest funeral ever seen in 

Somerset. 
Miss him ? Guess we miss Micajah, but if ever 

dreams come true, 
I've a sort of sneaking notion that he hasn't yet 

got through 
Settling things for us in Hudson ; for I dreamed 

— and this is straight — 

That I died and went to Heaven, but was yanked 

up at the gate. 
Peter showed me facts and figures, all the 

records, and allowed 
That I'd have to take my chances down below 

with t'other crowd ; 
— Said the thing was pretty even, but he had to 

draw it fine. 
Then commenced to hunt the index for the next 

shade in the line. 



86 UP IN MAINE 

I protected, and we had it, this and that, and pro 

and con. 
And I hung and begged and argued when he 

told me to move on. 
Till at last he called a cherub, sent the little 

chap inside. 
Owning up that he was bothered as to how he 
should decide. 
" But I'll give you all the show 
That I can," said he. " You know, 
I've arranged, in case of doubt, 
— '- When it's close, — to leave it out 
To Uncle Micajah Strout." 



'ROUND HOME 8T 

THE TRUE STORY OF A KICKER 

There lived two frogs, so I've been told, 

In a quiet wayside pool ; 
And one of those frogs was a blamed bright frog, 

But the other frog was a fool. 

Now a farmer man with a big milk can 

Was wont to pass that way ; 
And he used to stop and add a drop 

Of the aqua pure, they say. 

And it chanced one morn in the early dawn. 
When the farmer's sight was dim, 

He scooped those frogs in the water he dipped, 
— Which same was a joke on him. 

The fool frog sank in the swashing tank 

As the farmer bumped to town. 
But the smart frog flew like a tug-boat screw. 

And he swore he'd not go down. 

So he kicked and splashed and he slammed and 

thrashed, 
^ And he kept on top through all ; 
And he churned that milk in first-class shape 
In a great big butter ball. 



88 UP IN MAINE 

Now when the milkman got to town, 

And opened the can, there lay 
The fool frog drowned ; but, hale and sound. 

The kicker he hopped away. 

MORAL. 

Don't fret your life with needless strife, 

Yet let this teaching stick : 
You'll find, old man, in the world's big can 

It sometimes pays to kick. 



'ROUND HOME 89 

ZEK'L PRATT'S HARRYCANE 

'Twould make an ox curl up and die 
To hear how Zek'l Pratt would lie. 

— Why, that blamed Zeke 

Could hardly speak 
Without he'd let some whopper fly. 
Come jest as natchrul to him, too, 

— 'Twas innocent, and them as knew 
Zeke's failin's never took great stock. 
But jest stood back and let him talk ; 
Jest let him thrash his peck o' charf. 
Then got behind his back to laugh. 
V/hy, Zeke would — jest hold on and see 
What that old liar told to me. 

Last fall while gettin' in his grain 
He said he see'd a harrycane 

— A cikerloon, as they say West — 
A-boomin' on like all possesst. 
And Zekel see'd to his consarn 

'Twas bound plumb straight for his new barn. 

" 'Twas crickitul," says he. " Thinks I, 
I've got to be almighty spry. 
If somethin' ain't done kind o' brash 
That barn will get chawed inter hash. 
It don't take long for me to think. 
And what I done was quicker'n wink. 



90 UP IN MAINE 

Jest gafflin' up a couple boards 
I sashayed out deerectly to'ards 
That howlin', growlin' harrycane 
That come a-raisin' merry Cain. 

" When I'd got out as fur's my wind 
Would take me, I slacked up and shinned 
That cob-piled monnyment o' stones 
Between my land and Bial Jones. 

Though I don't scare 

I'll own, I swear. 
It sent a twitter through my bones 
When I got where that I could see 
The thing 'twas goin' to tackle me. 
'Twas big and round and blacker'n Zip, 

— And powerful ? My sakes, 'twould grip 
A tree or barn or line o' fence 

And make 'em look like thirty cents. 
While all the time it growled and chawed 
And spit the slivers forty rod. 

— As things looked then a bob-tailed darn 
Was too much price for Pratt's new barn. 

" But let me tell ye this, my son, 
Me'n them boards warn't there for fun. 
I held one underneath each arm ; 

The ends stuck out 

In front about 



'ROUND HOME 91 

Ten feet. I held 'em aidge to aidge 

And made a fust-class kind of wedge. 

I grit my teeth. There was a calm 

For jest a minit, kind o' 's ef 

That harrycane had stopped itse'f 

And snickered, snorted, laughed, and yelled, 

Then stopped again and sort o' held 

Its breath ; then swellin' up its breast 

Swooped down to knock me galley-west. 

" It grabbed them boards and then 'twas fight ! 

But scare me ? Not a gol-durned mite ! 

It pulled and tugged and yanked and hauled 

And tooted, howled, and squealed and squalled ; 

It picked up sculch and dirt, and threw. 

And followed with a tree or two ; 

It hit me with a rotten squash. 

And give me fits with Marm Jones' wash. 

But 'twarn't no use, suh, Zek'l Pratt 

Ain't built to scare at things like that. 

I jest let into that air tyke 

And punched its innards reg'lar-like 

With them 'ere boards, and honest true, 

I split her square and plumb in two. 

One half went yowlin' by to right 

And one to left — and out of sight. 

While Zek'l Pratt was still on deck 

With Marm Jones' night-gown round his neck." 



92 UP IN MAINE 

THOSE PICKLES OF HARM'S 

It doesn't need eyesight to tell that it's fall, 

Up here in Maine. 
Though the glamor of yellow is over it all, 

And the cold, swishing rain 
Comes peltering down and goes stripping the 

leaves. 
And smokes in cold spray from the edge of the 

eaves. 
All, it's wild out of doors, but come in here with 

me 
Where mother's as busy as busy can be. 
And you need not your eyes, sir, to know it is fall 
In this stifle and stirring and steam like a pall. 
For there's savor of spices and odorous charms 
When your nose gets a sniff of these pickles df 

marm's. 

You know it is fall without using your eyes. 

Up here in Maine. 
There is fragrance that floats as the flower-pot 
dies 
In the tears of the rain. 
And the hand of the frost strips the sheltering 

leaves 
From the pumpkins, those bombs of the sentinel 
sheaves 



'ROUND HOME 93 

That stiffly and starkly keep guard in the field, 
A desolate rank without weapon or shield. 
And the fragrance of death like a delicate musk 
Floats up from the field through the crispness of 

dusk ; 
Yet out from the kitchen, more savory far, 
Drifts the fragrance of pickles compounded by 

ma. 

The autumn sweeps past like a dame to a ball, 

Up here in Maine. 
Her perfumes would stagger shy Springtime, but 
Fall, 
Like a matron of Spain, 
Puts musk in her bosom and scent on her hair, 
And prinks her gay robe with elaborate care. 
Yet the fragrance she sheds has the savor of 

death. 
The brain is turned giddy beneath her fierce 

breath, 
Till over it all floats the vigorous scent 
Of spices and hot things and good things, all 

blent ; 
It's wonderful, friend, how it tickles and calms, 
— That whiff from those simmering pickles of 

marm's. 



94 UP IN MAINE 

"THE MAN I KNEW I KILLED" 

Ezra Saunders, of Hopkins' Creek, 

Was the next old soldier asked to speak. 

He'd seen his share of the thousands slain 

In the active days of the Umteenth Maine ; 

And we settled back to hear him tell 

His reasons for thinking that " War is Hell." 



" Dear comrades of Keesuncook Post and ladies 

of the Corps, 
I thank you for this invite and I'm proud to 

take the floor. 
I was thinkin' as I set here of the battles that 

I've fought. 
Of the suff 'rin' and the slaughter — and the 

sudden, awful thought 
Come across me that I'd taken very likely scores 

of lives, 
— Taken fathers from their children, taken 

husbands from their wives. 
While mad with heat of battle I was pumping 

reeking lead. 
Not knowing, no, nor caring, where the bullet 

found its bed. 
Now people they will ask us if we really, truly 

know 
For a fact that while a-fightin' we have ever 

killed a foe. 



'ROUND HOME 95 

But it's rare you find a soldier who has seen, in 

heat of strife, 
That the bullet he had fired was the one to take 

a life. 
Now, to°night, I'm going to tell you, though I 

hate to, boys, I swan, 
That I know I've done my murder ; that I know 

I've killed my man. 

" 'Twas when we got our rapping at the fight of 

Hatcher's Run ; 
I was running hard as any ; — yes, I threw away 

my gun 
And the rest of my equipment, and proceeded, 

friends, to steer 
Just as fast as legs would help me for protection 

at the rear. 
I was quite a nervy sprinter — 'bout as swift as 

you will find, 
But I couldn't shake that Johnny who came 

slammin' on behind; 
For he had the Georgy straddle and was sort of 

razor-edged. 
And if nothin' special busted, I was spoke for, 

so I jedged. 
He was hanging to his rifle, but he didn't try to 

shoot, 
^-He see he had me solid, — but I give the 

blame galoot 



96 UP IN MAINE 

A standard mile or such-like and had druv him 

' in the list,' 
When I stepped upon a hubble, fell, and give 

my leg a twist. 
And the tumble sort of stunned me so I laid 

there quite a spell, . 
Expectin' that he'd grab me ; just a-harkin' for 

his yell. 
But things stayed calm and quiet, so I peeked ; 

he laid there sprawled 
'Bout a dozen yards behind me. And he looked 

so queer I crawled 
Slowly back to reconnoitre, got where I could 

see his head, 
Saw his face was black's a stove-pipe. Apo- 
plexy! He was dead. 
And I stood and wept above him, stirred, dear 

comrades, to the peth 
With the awful, awful pity for that man I'd run 

to death. 
And my conscience always pricked me and my 

heart with grief is filled. 
For there ain't no question, comrades, there's a 

man I know I killed." 



'LONG SHORE 



'LONG SHORE 99 

CRUISE OF THE ''NANCY P." 

We was off Seguin with the " Nancy P.," 

From the Sheepscot bound for Boston way ; 
We was one day out, and massy me ! 

What a leak she'd sprung sence she left the bay ! 
Why, never knowed sech an awful leak, 
Gad, we made her old pump squeak. 
Gad, we made it whoop and hump, 
— Two at a turn, on the stiddy jump, — 
Ker-chonk, ker-chump, 
With an up yo-ho and a down ker-bump. 

But the more we pumped, the more she drawed. 

And we all turned to for a mighty pull ; 
But when we giv' her the soundin' rawd. 
Why, bless yer soul, she was jam, bang full. 
Plumb, jamb full to the soaked old deck, 
Full to her gol-durned tarred old neck ; 
Wonder was how she kept aflo't, 
With the sea a-gozzlin' in her thro't ; 
Ker-do't, ker-do't, 
— And we couldn't leave, 'cause there warn't no 
bo't. 

So we hung to the pump and we giv' her Cain, 
Though it didn't seem to be no use. 

We thought of the good dry ground in Maine, 
And durned the pelt of that old caboose, 



100 UP IN MAINE 

Durned the hide of a tops'l tub, 
For we never thought we'd see the Hub ; 
— Got so scart we forgot to thank 
Our lucky stars for a lo'd of plank, 
Ker-chink, ker-chank, 
And still we bounced that old pump crank. 

So we woggled on like a bale of hay, 

And we set our teeth and we pumped with 
groans. 
At last we got to Boston bay ; 

But our arms were stretched to our ankle bones, 
Hands were the size of corn-fed hams, 
Eyes bulged out like the horns o' rams. 
We humped like monkeys bound for war, 
And ev'ry man had a raw, red paw, 
Ker-haw, ker-haw, 
We beached that tub — and then we saw — 

The " Nancy P.," she'd grown that old, 

Her butts had rotted all away. 
Her lo'd of planks still jammed the hold, 
But we'd left her bottom in Sheepscot bay. 
So there we'd made a turrible try 
To pump old 'Lantic ocean dry. 
Over our rail, 'twixt you and me. 
We'd h'isted, suttin, a mile of sea; 
Blame me ! But we 
Was a darn sick crowd on the " Nancy P.'' 




"We was oif Segain with the * Nancy P.' " 



'LONG SHORE 101 

TALE OF THE SEA-FARING MAN 

I purchased a glass of stiff Maine grog for a 

salty son of the sea, 
And he confidentially leaned on the bar and 

spun this yarn for me: 

" 'Twas down in the aidge of the Saragos' in the 

nineteenth latitood 
That I think I see the dumdest sight that ever a 

sailor viewed. 

" We was dobbin' along with dumpy sails in a 

nigh-about dead calm, 
When the forrard watch give a good long squint, 

and he yapped a loud alarm. 

"And there afloat, two points to port, was a 

shark, a reg'lar he 'un, 
The biggest shark I've ever seen outside the 

Caribbeun. 

" The old man reckoned he'd have his pelt, and 

he yelled to the second mate, 
'Sling over the biggest hook ye've got, with a 

good big plug o' bait.' 

" We dragged her astern and his nobs come on, 

and then with a mighty splosh. 
He gulped the pork, he bit the rope, and away 

he went, by gosh ! 



102 UP IN MAINE 

'' But when he'd hipered two miles to lee, and 

begun to wopse and wheel, 
We figgered he found the lunch he had a rayther 

too hearty meal. 

'' Yet right behind the quarter wash the critter 

swum next day, 
And though he gobbled the bait we threw, he 

alius got away. 

'^ And at last, do ye know, we liked the cuss for 

the way he showed his spunk. 
And we named him Pete, and shared salt hoss, 

and tossed him a daily junk. 

" He got the orts of the fish we caught and, all 

in all, I'll bet 
A two-hoss waggin wouldn't haul the stuff that 

critter et. 

'^ Then one day Jones, the heftiest man we had 

in all the crew. 
Went off the rail with a swinging sail, and Pete 

he et him too. 

" From that time on we tipped our caps to the 

razor-backed old brute, 
— We tipped our caps and pulled a bovf in a 

most profound salute ; 



'LONG SHORE 103 

" For 'twas only due from a decent crew to honor 

a comrade's grave, 
Though 'twas odd, I'll own, to have a tomb afloat 

on the ocean wave. 

'' And the old man ordered the fish lines coiled, 
for he 'lowed 'twarn't proper game 

To bob behind for a grave-yard lot ; so Pete 
swum on the same, 

" — Swum on the same, though we come to see 

that he didn't act quite right. 
For he grew as thin's a belayin' pin on that gol- 

durned appetite. 

"And we couldn't figger the secret out, though 

the second mate was firm 
That stowed 'tween decks in the shark's insides 

was a bastin' big tape-worm. 

" As we didn't have no vermifuge we could only 

mourn for Pete, 
And steal salt hoss when the mate warn't round, 

and give him lots to eat. 

" But at last he rolled his glassy eyes and give 

an awful churn. 
And turned his belly up to view and drifted off 

astern. 



104 UP IN MAINE 

" He rolled and sogged on a logy swell like a 

nut-cake dropped in fat, 
And it 'peared to all there was suthin' wrong 

with the shark we was lookin' at. 

'^ So the old man ordered the gig crew up, and 

the bos'n piped a tune, 
And away we sploshed with the mate ahead 

a-grippin' a big harpoon. 

" He slung the thing when we drew abreast and 

we backed like all-possessed ; 
But the shark was sleepin' sound, you bet, for 

we never broke his rest. 

" — We never broke his peaceful snooze, though 

plunk to the eyelet head 
Went rippin' in that big harpoon, — for, you see, 

the shark was dead. 

^' And the old man ordered an ortopsy, for the 

thing seemed mighty queer 
That an able-bodied, hearty shark was deader'n 

a door-knob here. 

''So the mate was medical 'xaminer, and he 

straddled the critter's back 
And laid him open from deck to keel with one 

almighty whack. 



'LONG SHORE 105 

" Now listen close while I tell the rest, for this is 
the story's peth, 

— You may take my nob for a scuttle-butt if 
the shark warn't starved to death. 

" Starved to death, though the sea was full of 
the fattest kind of fish, 

— Starved, though a seaman plump and sound 
had tumbled in his dish, 

" — Starved though he had in his gorged insides 

I'll bet a hundredweight 
Of every kind of a floating thing from codfish 

down to bait. 

^' And this was how : He'd spied, we judged, an 

empty cask afloat. 
And bein' a glutten he grabbed the thing and 

tucked it down his throat. 

" The cask, we found, had an open end — the 
bottom was good and stout 

— The shark had swallowed the whole end fust 
— the open end was out. 

" And ev'ry mossel the critter et was scooped by 

the cask inside ; 
His vittles failed to reach the spot, and so the 

poor shark died." 



106 UP IN MAINE 

This is a sample of weird, wild yarns the marin- 
ers relate 

Under the spur of a glass of grog in a Prohibi- 
tion State. 



'LONG SHORE 107 

CAP'N NUTTER OF THE 
" PUDDENTAME " 

The foam bells tinkle at gilded prow 

— There's a creamy wake to the far horizon. 
And she tiptoes along with a New York bow 
To the curt'sying waves, and we'll all allow, 
She's the daintiest yacht we have set our eyes 
on. 
While sneaking after, in grimy shame, 
Rolls tops'l schooner, the " Puddentame." 

On the rocking surge swings the millionaire. 
And about him splendor and music and 
laughter ; 
The glint of jewels and ladies fair ; 
Jollity throned, and Old King Care 

Drowned in the brine and dragging after. 
But the billows lift and toss the same 
Old Cap'n Nutter in the " Puddentame." 

Under the gloom of the Porcupines, 

In the gleam of the lights of the summer city. 
In a tapestried cabin the rich man dines, 
And toasts his friends in his bubbling wines. 
While the repartee and the careless ditty 
Float from the lips of squire and dame 
To Cap'n Nutter of the " Puddentame." 



108 UP IN MAINE 

And the old man munches his bread and cheese 

In the gloom and grime of his little cuddy ; 
— Through the mirk of the dusty deadlight sees 
This riot of riches ; then on his knees 

— This sea-stained, warped old fuddy-duddy — 
He prays for their souls in the Saviour's 

name, 
— - Does Cap'n Nutter of the " Puddentame.'^ 

And they ? — Why, they neither know nor care 
That the honest chap has knelt and pleaded. 
For just at the edge of the dazzling glare 
From the rocking yacht of the millionaire. 
The old craft swings and sways unheeded. 
Yet who'll sleep better, jaded Fame 
Or Cap'n Nutter of the " Puddentame " ? 



'LONG SHORE 109 

GOOD-BY, LOBSTER 

We've gazed with resignation on the passing of 

the auk, 
Nor care a continental for the legendary rok ; 
And the dodo and the bison and the ornith-o- 

rhyn-chus 
May go and yet their passing brings no shade of 

woe to us. 
We entertain no sorrow that the megatherium 
Forever and forever is departed, dead and 

dumb: 
But a woe that hovers o'er us brings a keen and 

bitter pain 
As we weep to see the lobster vanish off the 

coast of Maine. 

Oh, dear crustacean dainty of the dodge-holes 

of the sea, 
I tune my lute in minor in a threnody for thee. 
You've been the nation's martyr and 'twas wrong 

to treat you so. 
And you may not think we love you; yet we 

hate to see you go. 
We've given you the blazes and hot-potted you, 

and yet 
We've loved you better martyred than wheii 

living, now you bet. 



110 UP IN MAINE 

You have no ears to listen, so, alas, we can't 

explain 
The sorrow that you bring us as you leave the 

coast of Maine. 

Do you fail to mark our feeling as we bitterly 

deplore 
The passing of the hero of the dinner at the 

shore ? 
Ah, what's the use of living if you also can't 

survive 
Until you die to furnish us the joy of one 

" broiled live " ? 
And what can e'er supplant you as a cold dish 

on the side ? 
Or what assuage our longings when to salads 

you're denied ? 
Or what can furnish thunder to the legislative 

brain 
When ruthless Fate has swept you from the rocky 

coast of Maine ? 

I see, and sigh in seeing, in some distant, future 

age 
Your varnished shell reposing under glass upon 

a stage. 
The while some pundit lectures on the curios of 

the past, 



'LONG SHORE 111 

And dainty ladies shudder as they gaze on you 

aghast. 
And all the folks that listen will wonder vaguely 

at 
The fact that once lived heathen who could eat 

a Thing like that. 
Ah, that's the fate you're facing — but laments 

are all in vain 
— Tell the dodo that you saw us when you 

lived down here in Maine. 



112 UP IN MAINE 

CURE FOR HOMESICKNESS 

She wrote to her daddy in Portland, Maine, from 

ont in Denver, Col., 
And she wrote, alas, despondently that life had 

commenced to pall ; 
And this was a woful, woful case, for she was 

a six months' bride 
Who was won and wed in the Stat^ of Maine by 

the side of the bounding tide. 
And ah, alack, she was writing back that she 

longed for Portland, Maine, 
Till oh, her feelings had been that wrenched she 

could hardly stand the strain ! 
Though her hubby dear was still sincere, she 

sighed the livelong day 
For a good old sniff of the sewers and salt from 

the breast of Casco bay. 
And she wrote she sighed, and she said she'd 

cried, and her appetite fell off, 
And she'd grown as thin's a belaying-pin, with a 

terrible hacking cough ; 
And she sort of hinted that pretty soon she'd 

start on a reckless scoot 
And hook for her home in Portland, Maine, by 

the very shortest route. 
But her daddy dear was a man of sense, and he 

handles fish wholesale, 



'LONG SHORE 113 

And he sat and fanned himself awhile with a 

big broad codfish tail ; 
And he recollected the way he felt when he 

dwelt in the World's Fair whirl. 
He slapped his head. " By hake," he said, '' I 

know what ails that girl." 
And he went to a ten-cord pile of cod and he 

pulled the biggest out, 
A jib-shaped critter, broad's a sail, — three feet 

from tail to snout. 
And he pasted a sheet of postage stamps from 

snout clear down to tail, 
Put on a quick delivery stamp, and sent the cod 

by mail. 
She smelled it a-coming two blocks off on the 

top of the postman's pack; 
She rushed to meet him, and scared him blind by 

climbing the poor man's back. 
But she got the fish, bit out a hunk, ate postage 

stamps and all. 
And a happy wife in a happy home lives out in 

Denver, Col. 



114 UP IN MAINE 

ON THE OLD COAST TUB 

Blast from the winter. Wrack-wood and splinter 

Adrift in the smother of roaring lee shore : 
And a blunt-nosed old coaster; some ancient 
sea-wagon, 
Sweeps in from the fog no more — no more, 
Rolls in from the sea no more. 



Bricks make her load and New York her destin- 
ation. 
(Dern yer hide, ye snoozer, keep a-pumping 
there, I say !) 
Bricks for a cargo and she leaks like thundera- 
tion. 
And the gulls a-trailin' after like the buzzards 
sniffin' prey ! 

Pump away ! 
And ev'ry brick a-soakin' in her innards growls 
and grates ; 
She hesitates — she balks and waits. 
And holy hawse-pipe, how she hates 
To leave Penobscot Bay ! 

Pounce ! On her bows leap the combers like 
a tiger-cat, 
(Lift 'er on the handle, there, you loafer, 
pump avv^ay !) 



'LONG SHORE 115 

Lurch ! Reels her gait, and her sloshin' scup- 
pers hiccup at 
The sight of drunken breakers fightin' past 
'er up the bay. 
Pump, I say ! 
Oh, give her all the rotten sail her leary masts 
will lug. 
Ka-chig, ka-chug ; her ugly mug 
Rolls orkord as a driftin' jug. 
And so we slosh away. 

Grub to last a week, a quadrant and an alma- 
nick ; 
(Wag 'er there, you rascal, wag 'er lively 
there, I say!) 
Rotten are her sails and her hold a-roar with 
shiftin' brick, 
— Ain't we up ag'inst it if a norther comes 
our way ? 

Pump, I say ! 
Stagger down, ye bloated drunkard, wheel and 
take the starboard tack ! 
Ka-slup, ka-smack, now work 'er back. 
Jest hear that old black canvas crack. 
Ho ! Davy Jones, hooray ! 



Black cordage tangled, dead features mangled, 
Adrift in the smother of roaring lee shore. 



116 UP IN MAINE 

And a blunt-nosed old coaster; some broad- 
bellied wagon 
Sweeps in from the sea no more — no more, 
— Rolls in from the sea no more. 



'LONG SHORE 117 

TALE OF THE KENNEBEC MARINER 

Guess I've never told you, sonny, of the strandin' 

and the wreck 
Of the steamboat ^' Ezry Johnson " that run up 

the Kennebec. 
That was 'fore the time of steam-cars, and the 

'' Johnson " filled the bill 
On the route between Augusty and the town of 

Waterville. 

She was built old-fashined model, with a 

bottom's flat's your palm, 
With a paddle-wheel behind her, druv' by one 

great churnin' arm. 
Couldn't say that she was speedy — sploshed 

along and made a touse. 
But she couldn't go much faster than a man 

could tow a house. 
Still, she skipped and skived tremendous, dodged 

the rocks and skun the shoals. 
In a way the boats of these days couldn't do to 

save their souls. 
Didn't draw no 'mount of water, went on top 

instead of through. 
This is how there come to happen what I'm go- 
ing to tell to t/ou. 



118 UP IN MAINE 

— Hain't no need to keep you guessing, for I 

know you won't suspect 
How that tliunderin' old " Ez. Johnson " ever 

happened to get wrecked. 

She was overdue one ev'nin', fog come down 

most awful thick ; 
'Twas about like navigating round inside a 

feather tick. 
Proper caper was to anchor, but she seemed to 

run all right. 
And we humped her — though 'twas resky — 

kept her sloshing through the night. 

Things went on all right till morning, but along 

'bout half-past three 
Ship went dizzy, blind, and crazy — waves 

seemed wust I ever see. 
Up she went and down she scuttered ; sometimes 

seemed to stand on end. 
Then she'd wallopse, sideways, cross-waj^s, in a 

way, by gosh, to send 
Shivers down your spine. She'd teeter, fetch a 

spring, and take a bounce. 
Then squat down, sir, on her haunches with a 

most je-roosly jounce. 
Folks got up and run a-screaming, forced the 

wheelhouse, grabbed at me. 



'LONG SHORE 119 

— Thought we'd missed Augusty landin' and 
had gone plum out to sea. 

— Fairly shot me full of questions, but I said 
'twas jest a blow ; 

Still, that didn't seem to soothe 'em, for there 
warn't no wind, you know ! 

Yas, sir, spite of all that churnin', warn't a whis- 
per of a breeze 

— No excuse for all that upset and those strange 
and dretful seas. 

Couldn't spy a thing around us — every way 
'twas pitchy black. 

And I couldn't seem to comfort them poor crit- 
ters on my back. 

Couldn't give 'em information, for 'twas dark's 
a cellar shelf ; 

— Couldn't tell 'em nothing 'bout it — for I 
didn't know myself. 

So I gripped the " Johnson's " tiller, kept the 

rudder riggin' taut. 
Kept a-praying, chawed tobacker, give her steam, 

and let her swat. 
Now, my friend, jest listen stiddy : when the sun 

come out at four. 
We warn't tossin' in the breakers off no stern 

and rockbound shore ; 



120 UP IN MAINE 

But I'd missed the gol-durned river, and I swow 

this 'ere is true, 
I had sailed eight miles 'cross country in a heavy 

autumn dew. 
There I was clear up in Sidney, and the tossings 

and the rolls 
Simply happened 'cause we tackled sev'ral miles 

of cradle knolls. 
Sun come out and dried the dew up ; there she 

was a stranded wreck. 
And they soaked me eighteen dollars' cartage to 

the Kennebec. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 123 

THE LAW 'GAINST SPIKE-SOLE BOOTS 

It's a case of scuff in your stocking-feet, from 

Seboomook down, my hearties ; 
Sling your spikers around your neck and swear 

your way to town. 
The dudes that we sent to legislate, and figger 

at balls and parties. 
Have tinkered the laws to suit themselves, and 

they've done us good and brown. 

There's a howl, you bet, from the Medway dam 

across to the Caucmogummac, 
For the laws came up in the tote-team mail, and 

we've got the new statoots, 
And of all the things that was ever planned to 

give us a gripe in the stomach. 
The worst is the corker that t'runs us down for 

a-wearin' our old calked boots. 

You can't chank on to a hotel floor, 
You've got to leave calked boots at the door. 
They make ye peel your bucks in the street 
And walk to the bar in your stocking-feet. 

It's a blank of a note that a man with chink 
Can't prance to the rail and get his drink. 
But it's five and costs if ye mar the paint. 
And ten if the feller that makes complaint 



124 UP IN MAINE 

Gets mad at a playful push in the eyes 
And goes into court with a lot of lies. 
It's ten if ye sliver a steam-bo't's deck 

— There ain't no argue — it's right in the neck. 
And they soak you, too, on the railroad train ; 

— Why, there's hardly a loggin' crew in Maine 
But what has claimed, as a nat'ral right, 

A chance to holler and beller and fight. 
And knock the stuffin' out of the seats, 
Rip off the blinds and club with the cleats. 
But now if the bloomin' brakeman talks. 
And you vaccinate him once with calks ; 
If you feel like a man with a royal flush 
And, jest for the joke of it, rip some plush. 
Oh, they take that law and they peel you sore ; 
You pay for the damage, and ten plunks more. 
'Tain't much like the days when we had some 

rights, 
When we roosters sharpened our spurs in fights, 
When never a crowd put up galoots 
That could scrap with the fellers with spike-sole 

boots. 



It's a case of step to the wangan camp, and buy 

some partent leathers ; 
And go a-snoopin' along to town like a dude on 

his weddin'-trip ; 
And the only thing you can do to a guy is to tickle 

his nose with feathers, 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 125 

And curl in your seats in the smokin'-car when 

a drummer gives you lip. 
There was fun, by gee, in the good old days 

when we whooped 'er into the city. 
And you trailed our way by the slivers we left 

from the railroad down to the dives, 
And we owned the town where we left our cash ; 

and now it's a thunderin' pity 
If all of a sudden youVe grown too good for the 

boys who are off the drives. 

Oh, make the laws, go make the laws with your 

derned old Legislature, 
Jest give us orders to wear plug hats and come 

down in full dress suits. 
We'll wear the togs; but give us spikes, or 

you've busted the laws of nature. 
For angels can just as well shed wings as a 

driver his spike-sole boots. 



126 UP IN MAINE 

THE CHAP THAT SWINGS THE AXE 

Sing a song of paper ; first the tall, straight 

spruce, 
Torn from off the mountains for the roaring 

presses' use. 

— A shrieking laceration by the ""barker" and 
the saw ; 

A slow, grim maceration in the grinder's grum- 
bling maw ; 

A dizzy dash through calenders and over whir- 
ring rolls, 

— And the press can smut the paper so's to save 
or damn your souls ; 

The press has got the paper, it can give you lies 
or facts 

— That vexes not the fellow up in Maine who 
swings the axe. 



Chock ! 

Chock! 

Chock ! 
The throb stuttered up from the heart of the 

wood. 
Erratic and faint, yet the trees understood, 
— Though distant and dull like the tick of a 

clock 
It started a tremor through all the great flock. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 127 

King Spruce was a-shiver and rooted with dread. 
While past him to safety the wood people fled ; 
The fox with his muzzle turned backward to 

snuff 
The bear trundling on like an animate muff. 
And rabbits up-ending in wonder and fright. 
Then scudding once more with the others in 

flight. 
Yet that which has reason most urgent to flee 
Stands grim in the rout of the panic — the 

Tree ! 
While up the long slope, glaring red 'gainst the 

snow, — 
His shirt of the hue of the butcher, — the foe. 
Beating fierce at the trunks with relentless 

attacks. 
Comes on to the slaughter, the Man with the Axe. 
Chock ! 

Chock! 

Chock ! 
Shudder and totter and shiver and rock ! 
— Pygmy assailing with dull steady knock. 
Trunk yawning wide with a hideous gash. 
Snow-covered limbs thrown a-sprawl; and 
then crash ! 
The pens and the presses are waiting, and eyes 
That will glow with delight, or dilate with sur- 
prise. 



128 UP IN MAINE 

For there in the heart of the spruce there is 
rolled 

The fabric for thousands of stories untold. 

And on the white paper may later be spread 

The fall of a nation, or fame of one dead 

Who now strides abroad in his health and suc- 
cess, 

But will pass to the tomb when that log meets 
the press. 

There under the bark of that spruce there is 
furled 

A web that will carry the news of a world, 

That clamors and crowds at the swaying red 
backs 

Of the toilers of Maine, the rough men of the 
axe. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 129 

THE SONG OF THE WOODS' 
DOG-WATCH 

'Tis the weirdly witching hour of the woods' 

" dog-watch," 
When the guide suspends the kettle in the ash 

limb's crotch, 
Stirs the drowsy, drowsy embers till the cozy 

fire beams 
And flickers dance like gnomes and elves athwart 

the glowing dreams 
Of the sleeping town-bred fisher who is stretched 

with placid soul 
On the earth in sweeter slumber than his town 

couch can cajole. 
Ah, 'tis tough on bone and muscle, is this chas- 
ing after fun — 
And a sleeper gets to sleeping forty knots along 

'bout one. 
But the guide is up a-stirring — monstrous shape 

with flaring torch. 
Prodding up the dozing fire for the woods' " dog- 
watch." 
And the slow unclosing eyelids of the startled 

dreamer see 
This dreadful apparition thrown in shadows on a 

tree. 
And his heart for just a second goes to skirrup- 

ing about 



130 UP IN MAINE 

As it flopped when he was wrestling with that 

five-three-quarter trout. 
But the ogre leaves the shadows, leans against 

a handy tree 
And remarks: ''The water's bilin'; won't ye 

have a cup o' tea ? " 
And he wakes to a night of the fisherman's 

June, 
— Afar the weird lilt of the dolorous loon 
Floats up from the heart of the fair, velvet 

night — 
A globule of sound winging slow in its flight. 
As elfin a note as a gnome ever blew, 
It wells from the waters, '' Ah-loo-hoo-ah-hoo- 

o-o-o." 
O spell of the forest ! O glimmer and gleam 
From the sheen of the lake and the mist-breath- 
ing stream ! 
The night and the stars and the dolorous loon 
Make mystic the spell of the fisherman's June. 

The spruces sing the lyric of the wood's dog- 
watch ; 

The kettle as it bubbles in the ash limb's crotch. 

The rustle of the spindles of the hemlock and 
the pine. 

The crackle where the licking tongues of ruddy 
fire twine. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 131 

The oboe, in the distance, of the weird and lone- 
some loon, 

— This chorus sings the lyric of the blessed 
month of June. 

What June? Your June of meadows or your 

June of scented breeze, 
Or your June begirt with roses stretched in 

hammock at her ease? 
Such a deity for maidens ! I can bow to no 

such June ! 
I extol the mystic goddess of the Forest's Silent 

Noon. 

— Noon of day or noon of night-time — in the 
vast and silent deeps. 

Where human care or human woe or human 

envy sleeps. 
Where rugged depths surround me, dim and 

silent, deep and wide. 
And no human shares my joy but that second 

self, my guide. 

— Here's a June that one can worship. Here's 
a June by right a queen, 

'Neath her hand eternal mountains, 'neath her 

feet eternal green. , 
And here will I adore her, seeking out her 

awful throne 
With the Silence swimming round me, and 

alone, thank God, alone ! 



132 UP IN MAINE 

FIDDLER CURED THE CAMP 

Wal, things they was deader'n old Billy-be-darn, 
The boss was pernickity, cook wouldn't yarn ; 
For we'd heard ev'ry story old Beans had to spin, 
And we hadn't no longin's to hear 'em agin ; 
Old Pitts, the head chopper, we'd pumped him 

out, too, 
— And he swow'd that he'd sung ev'ry song 

that he knew. 
As the rest wasn't gifted, a sort of a damp 
Old glister of silence fell over Peel's camp. 
The deacon-seat doldrums were blacker'n old Zip, 
We'd set there an hour with never a yip, 
'Cept the suckin' o' lips at the quackin' T.D.'s, 
With the oof and the woo of the lonesome pine 

trees 
W'istling over our smok'-hole. It grew on us, 

too; 
Our thoughts got as thick an' as musty an' blue 
As the cloud o' tobacker smoke, mixed with the 

steams 
From the woolens that dried on the stringers 

and beams. 
Old Attegat Peter said we was bewitched ; 
He said that he seed the Old Gal when she 

twitched 
A fistful o' hair out the gray bosses' tail 
For a-makin' witch tattin'. She'd hung on a nail 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 133 

The queerisome web, so he said, an' the holes 
— They were fifty — they stood for the whole 
of our souls. 

An' there we would swing, an' hang there we 

must. 
Till the hoodoo was busted. Eternally cussed, 
So he said, was the buffle-brained feller that 

dared 
To touch the witch-web that was holding us 

snared. 

Aw, we didn't believe it — 'tain't like that we 

did! 
But still we warn't fussy! If we could get 

rid 
Of the dumps by a charm, we was ready to try. 
And Peter said singin' would knock 'em sky 

high. 
Wal, Peter said " singin' ; " I can't tell a lie, 
'Twarn't singin', 'twarn't nothin' — that mourn- 
ful ki-yi ! 
That seemed like a beller in ev'ry man's boot. 
An' 'twarn't none surprisin' the witch didn't 

scoot. 
So there did we set in a stew an' a cloud, 
A grumpy old, lumpy old dob of a crowd. 



134 UP IN MAINE 

But oh, landsy sake a-Peter, when the fiddle come 
to camp, 
Wy you wouldn't know the place : 
— Wuz a grin on ev'ry face 
Wen we know'd the critter'd got it. An' it 

reely seemed the lamp 
Had a 'lectric light attachment; an' you 

oughter heard us stamp 
When that feller took his fiddle out an' rosined 
up the bow. 
Then he yawked an' yeaked an' yawked 
'Twistin' keys ontil she squawked, 
An' we set there jest a-gawpin' ; not a word to 

say, but, oh. 
We was right on pins an' needles fer to have 
him let 'er go. 

Tweedle-weedle, yeaky, yawky, 'nother twist, 
an' pretty soon 
He was waitin' to begin. 
With 'er underneath his chin ; 
He a-askin', all a-grinnin', " Wall, boys, name 

it; what's your tune?" 
An' we hollered all in concert, " Whoop 'er up 
on ^Old Zip Coon'!" 

Oh, the deacon-seat had cushions an' the bunks 
were stuffed with down, 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 135 

While the feller sawed the strings ; 
We could feel our sproutin' wings, 
An' we wanted to go soarin', go a-sailin', wear a 

crown. 
Tear the ground up, whoop-ta-ra-ra, mix some 
red and paint the town. 

Oh, he played the " Lights o' London " an' he 
played " The Devil's Dream," 
— All the old ones — played 'em all ; 
Rode right on 'er — made 'er squall ; 
Didn't stop to semi-quiver, tip-toe Nancy, pass 

the cream ; 
No ; he let 'er go Jerooshy, clear the track an' 
lots o' steam. 

Thought I'd never heerd such playin' sence the 
Lord had giv' me breath 
An' that P. I. — seems as if 
He could put the bang an' biff 
In the chitter of a cat-gut like to touch the very 

peth 
In yer marrow ; like to raise yer from the very 
jaws of death. 

So, oh, landsy sake a-Peter, when that fiddle 
come our way. 



136 UP IN MAINE 

Say, you wouldn't know the place, 
— Wus a grin on ev'ry face. 
— Went to workin' like the blazes an' our vittles 

set — an' say, 
Guess the Hoodoo flew to thunder when the 
Haw-Haw come to stay. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 13T 

THE SONG OF THE SAW 

The song is the shriek of the strong that are 
slain, 

— The monarchs that people the woodlands of 

Maine ; 
— 'Tis the cry of a merciless war. 
And it echoes by river, by lake, and by stream, 
Wherever saws scream or the bright axes gleam, 

— 'Tis keyed to the sibilant rush of the steam, 
And the song is the song of the saw. 

Come stand in the gloom of this clamorous 

room. 
Where giants groan past us a-drip from the 

boom, 
Borne here from the calm of the forest and hill, 

— Aghast at the thunderous roar of the mill. 
At rumble of pulley and grumble of shaft 
And the tumult and din of the sawyer's rude 

craft. 

Stand here in the ebb of the riotous blast. 

As the saw's mighty carriage goes thundering 

past. 
One man at the lever and one at the dog. 
The slaughter is bloodless and senseless the 

log, 



138 UP IN MAINE 

Yet the anguish of death and the torment of 

hell 
Are quavering there in the long, awful yell, 
That shrills above tumult of gearing and wheel 
As the carriage rolls down and the timber meets 

steel. 

Scream ! And a board is laid bare for a home. 
Shriek ! And a timber for mansion and dome, 
For the walls of a palace, or toil's homely use. 
Is reft from the flanks of the prostrate King 

Spruce. 
And thus in the clamor of pulley and wheel, 
In the plaint of the wood and the slash of the 

steel, 
Is wrought the undoing of Maine's sturdy lords, 
— The martyrs the woodlands yield up to our 

swords. 
The song is the knell of these strong that are 

slain. 
The monarchs that people the woodlands of 

Maine. 
And the Fury that whirls in the din of this 

war. 
With rioting teeth and insatiable maw, is the 

saw! 
And this is the song of the saw. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 139 

DOWN THE TRAIL WITH GUM PACKS 

Ev'ry nugget clean and sound, 
Red's a jewel, smooth and round. 
Worth a dollar'n ten a pound ; 
Here's your gum, ye giddy girls. 
Here's your Maine spruce gum. 
The chaps that went off with the Klondike 
diggers 

For gold — jest gold. 
Have slumped in the snow, and they work like 
niggers. 

And they haven't got rich, we're told. 
We're snowshoeing down from the north of 
Katahdin, 

See here ! Yum, yum ! 
Here's a tole to tease Maud to come into the 
garden 

—These rich, rosy lumps o' spruce gum. 



Our fires are dowsed in the lonesome old camps, 
We've left them to wolves and the foxes and 

damps. 
The trail of our snowshoes lies snakin' behind. 
For we're clawing for home with the treasures 

we've mined. 
We've no sort of use for the pick and the sluice ; 
Our Klondike has been the straight trunks of 

the spruce. 



140 UP IN MAINE 

Let them that elect grub the dirt for a "gleam," 
Our ore is the gum and our lode is the seam 
That doesn't go sneaking in mire and clay, 
But grins at the sun and drinks deep of broad day. 

Go grope for your gold in the bowels of mud ! 
We'll cleave our fresh nuggets of resinous blood 
Forced out from the heart through the fibre and 

vein 
Of the giants who lurk in the woodlands of 

Maine. 

Just squint through this bubble and gaze at the 

blaze : 
That red is the fire of hot summer days ; 
That glimmer is autumn ; that glow is the tint 
That was lent by some campfire's guttering glint. 
And here is a globe like the eye of a cat. 
And this one is amber like honey ; and that 
Is a tear rosy red with the anger and shame 
Of a king glooming down as the axe-heavers 

came ; 
— Staring down as around him his kin roared 

to earth 
Midst the oaths of the swampers and Labor's 

rude mirth. 
That tear of the spruce, may it go to the pearls 
Flashing bright 'neath the lips of some sweetest 

of girls ! 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 141 

These, then, are the treasures we bring in our 

packs, 
— Each round, rosy globule as sweet as the 

smacks 
We'll get from the kids when they swoop with 

a roar 
At dad just the second he opens the door. 
Clear out your old scraps, Mr. Druggist: we 

come 
With a good hefty jag of the season's new gum. 
Ev'ry nugget clear and sound. 
Red's a jewel, smooth and round. 
Worth a dollar'n ten a pound. 
Here's your gum, ye giddy girls, 
Here's your Maine spruce gum. 



142 UP IN MAINE 

REAR O' THE DRIVE 

The rain has raised the river an' she's ap to 

driving pitch, 
An' it's oh, an' grab your peavies an' go sloppin' 

in the wet. 
We've got ter send 'er whoopin' now without a 

ketch or hitch, 
But it won't be kid-glove bus'ness, oh, my 
hearties, you can bet. 
Empty the water out of your boots 
And gaffie your peavies, you P. I. galoots. 
There's the rips at Rundy's Corner, and the 

sluice at Puzzle Gorge ; 
You can drive 'em and connive 'em, but the 

timber's bound to lodge. 
An' sticks Avill buck — with best of luck — as 

offish-like as hogs. 
For there ain't no calkerlatin' how you'll run a 

drive o' logs. 

Chase the heathen with a sword, 
Run the cattle with a goad. 
All we want's our Oldtown peavies, when our 
drives go overboard. 
An' we'll foUer, sloshin' in, 
Yes, we'll waller to the chin, 
An' we'll herd 'em through the wildest stream 
that ever frothed and roared. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 143 

So, look alive, 
It's after five. 
An' the drouth is a-chasin' the rear o' the drive. 

FoUer down, f oiler down with your peavies on 

your backs. 
For the herd that runs ahead of us goes loafin' 

'less it's chased. 
They know they're off to market, an' they dread 

the saw an' axe. 
An' you've got to go and welt 'em, though the 

water's to your waist. 
For they balk on Depsconneagon when a sixty- 
footer halts ; 
Ev'ry eddy stands a-ready for to swing 'em in a 

waltz. 
An' ev'ry rock is chock-a-block with jack-strawed 

pine an' spruce, 
Ontil you've got the devil's job to try and turn 

'em loose. 

But our goadstick is the peavy, an' our cant-dog 

is the pup 
That'll worry 'em an' hurry 'em an' rush 'em, 

chase 'em up. 
Oh, the drouth is right behind us, but we've 

passed the North Twin flume. 
An' we'll beat the sun in heaven in the race for 

Pea Cove boom. 



144 UP IN MAINE 

MATIN SONG OF PETE LONG'S COOK 

It's dark in the camp, and the woods outside 

Are dark, dark, too ! 
And a hundred men still open wide 

Their loud bay-zoo. 
It's sort of mean to rout 'em jus' 

To work once more ; 
I'd like to let each tired cuss 

Jus' lay and snore. 
But I've been up for an hour or two 

And grub's all on ; 
And now as the cook of Pete Long's crew 

I toot my horn. 



The weirdest of all wood-sounds, by the way, 
Is a cook's queer cadence at break of day : 
Whoo-e-e-e ! 

Git UP ! 
The grub is on the table, boys, the coffee's on 

the bile : 
The swagon's hotter'n Tophet and I swear 'twill 

make you smile. 
There's whiskers on the gingerbread, the biskit 

can't be beat ; 
I've got molasses sinkers made from mother's 

old receipt. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 145 

— Oh, I've got molasses sinkers built around 
some extra holes ; 

They'll make you think of home and friends and 

tickle up your souls. 
The beans come out a-roarin' when I boosted 

up the lid ; 
They chuckled when I pried 'em out — they 

laughed, I swear they did. 
Don't jolly me about your smells of Araby the 

blest, 

— Jus' take a snuff of ground-baked beans all 
hot from out their nest. 

The grub is on the table, boys, hurroop, hurroop, 

whoo-e-e-e ! 
Come, tumble out, git on a move ! Good Lord, 

it's after three ! 
Rise up and shine, my gentle lambs, surround 

your breakfast quick. 
Or else you'll git the sun's ha-ha from over 

Tumble Dick. 
And if the timer heaves a growl and docks you 

in his book, 
Jus' blame j^our own durn lazy luck — don't 

lay it on the cook. 
For ev'ry man who's et my cream-of-tartar bis- 

kit knows 



146 UP IN MAINE 

The cook of this 'ere camp, by smut, 's the 
earliest bird that crows. 
For I'm old enough to spell a-a-a-ble ! 
The grub is all on the ta-a-a-ble ! 
Whoo-e-e-e ! 

Git UP ! 



I 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 147 

OFF FOR THE LUMBER WOODS 

The dujfiSie is packed, and the babies are smacked, 

and the wife has a buss and a hug ; 
And she's done it up brown in a-loading me 
down with about all the grub I can lug, 
So long ! Good-by ! 
I'm off ! Don't cry ! 
— Just about a month of Sundays and you'll 
see my homely mug. 



Now look ye, ye towzled-haired son of a gun. 
Be good to your mother or you'll see some 

fun 
When your daddy comes down on the drive in 

the spring 
And fetches a withe with a hornetty sting. 
Ha! ha! you young rascal, you'd rather have 

gum? 
Well, be a good baby and pa'U fetch you some. 

Yes, mother, you're right, it does seem kinder 

wrong 
To leave you alone here the whole winter 

long. 
And it's tough that I have to pack dunnage and 

break 
For the big timber wrassle at Chamberlain lake. 



148 UP IN MAINE 

But folks are a-waiting for lumber and boards, 
They've picked up their saws, now they've laid 

down their swords. 
They're wanting the timbers for new city domes, 
They're wanting the shingles for humble new 

homes. 
The hammers are waiting, the nails are on end, 
And the chorus of clatter'll commence when we 

send 
A billion of lumber down race-way and sluice. 
From the lonesome dominions of gloomy King 

Spruce. 
The men who print papers are wanting fresh 

sheets. 
The folks who build ships will be launching new 

fleets. 
For, mark me, no matter what Uncle Sam 

planned. 
He finds he can't reach his new back lots by 

land. 
Don't smile at me, wife, but I feel when I swing 
That sweaty old axe from the fall to the spring. 
That I hear one grim cry swimming up on the air 
Through the dim, silent forest, — a pleading 

prayer. 
The clank of the press, and the scream of the 

saws^ 
' Xhe grwit of the grinder that slavers and chaws 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 149 

At the fibre of pulp wood ; the purr of the plane 
Are blent in one chorus, attuned to one strain, 
— That sighs in the breezes or throbs in the roar 
Of the tempest ; and ever the cry is for " More." 
And we men with our axes and horn-covered 

palms 
Hear the call as a man hears the summons " To 

arms," 
And forward we plunge with no quarter, no 

truce. 
With axes a-gleam in the realms of King Spruce. 



The duffle is packed, and the babies are smacked ; 

now wife, for a buss and a hug. 
Save a smile 'gainst the spring, for I'm going to 
bring just all the spruce gum I can lug. 
I'm off! Good-bye! 
So 'long ! Don't cry ! 
In about a month of Sundays you will see my 
homely mug. 



150 UP IN MAINE 

HERE'S TO THE STOUT ASH POLE 

Hooray for to-day, and hooray for to-night, and 

forget all the rest of it, boys. 
Hold on, Mister Barkeeper, close up your jaw, 

we're paying for all of this noise. 
We won't mosey out, and we won't set down, 

and you can't keep a one of us still ; 
You can charge, if you want to, so much for a 

yawp ; we'll settle all right in the bill. 
For this is our very last evenin' on earth ; the 

last night we'll be here alive. 
To-morrow at six we all cut sticks for the rear of 

the West Branch drive. 

Hooray ! 
For Seboomook, and rear of the drive. 

Oh, bartender, say, can't you hustle them up ? 

Come, push out your reddest of paint. 
We're here for to splatter the carnation on, now 

blow us for fools if we ain't ! 
So set out your varnish for coffins, my boy, — 

that brand called the " Grave-diggers' Boast." 
I've got enough chink — now down with your 

drink ! and I'll give ye a riverman's toast. 



While you're raising up your glasses, 
Jest forget the giddy lasses 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 151 

That have coaxed away your dollars, and have 
given you the laugh. 
Turn away from them eonnivers, 
And as honest, hearty drivers 
Drink a good, round jorum to the stout ash staff. 
When the girls have filched your cash, 
There is still the hearty ash. 
It is waiting at Seboomook for to cheer your 
foolish soul. 
Ah, you know we love it most ; and I give 
you this, my toast. 
The river driver's darling, oh, his long ash pole. 

We've ridden the gorges on rioting logs, and 

we've always swept safe to the land. 
So long as we rode with the spikes in our boots, 

and the long, limber pole in our hand ; 
We've pried at the jams on the brink of the 

dams, and the pole has stood by like a man. 
And then in the dash for our lives in the crash 

the pole braced us up as we ran. 
Hooray ! 
As we yelled through the smother and ran. 

And when in the bellow of up-ending logs it 

looked like good-by to our souls 
We rode back to life from out of the strife, 

vaulting high on the end of our poles. 



152 UP IN MAINE 

Ah, these are the friends that stand by you, my 
boys : they're truer than all of the host 

Of the fair-spoken gang of the thieves of the 
town ! Crowd up here and drink to my 
toast ! . 



The girls were sweeter'n honey 

Till they gathered in our money, 
And the barkeeps they were pleasant just as 
long as we could spend. 

Now it's quite another story, 

— Case of throwdown ! But, by glory, 
We can drink this final jorum to our stout old 

friend. 
Though the gang has swiped our cash, there is 

still the heartjT^ ash. 
He is waiting at Seboomook for to cheer your 

foolish soul. 
After all, we love him most ! and he's still the 

last, loud toast 
— The driver's honest helper, oh, the long ash 

pole. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 153 
MISTER WHAT'S-HIS-NAME 

OF SEBOOMOOK 

Have you ever heard Seboomook with her April 
dander up, 
With the amber rushing river gorged to high- 
est drivin' pitch ? 
Have you heard her boom and bellow — rocky 
lips a-f roth with yellow — 
When she spews and spumes the torrents — 
oh, the wild and wicked witch ? 

She has menace in her breath. 
And she roars the chant of death. 
For the victim that she slavers never sees 
the sun again. 
And she clutches at the river. 
With entreaty that it give her 
The morsels for her longing, which are men — 
men — men ! 

Here's a tale to suit the cynic — 'tis a satire from 
the woods. 
And concerns a certain hero who was hunt- 
ing after Fame ; 
'Tis the grim and truthful story of a mighty 
reach for glory, 
But, alas, he didn't get it, for we've clean 
forgot his name ! 



154 UP IN MAINE 

He was one of Murphy's crew, 
And he swore that he'd go through 
Where no other West Branch driver ever saved 
the shirt he wore: 
For he vowed he'd shoot the gorge 
And allowed that he could dodge 
The Death that knelt a-clutching at the prey 
the waters bore. 



When they said he couldn't do it, why, he 
laughed the crowd to scorn, 
— Poled across the dimpling shallows with 
a fierce and hoarse good-by 
— He was Murphy's top-notch driver, half a bird 
and one-half diver, 
But the best who brave Seboomook only 
sound the depths to die, 

And they found him miles below; 
But his mother would not know 
The mangled mass Seboomook belched from out 
her vap'rous throat. 
The first man coming down 
Brought the story out to town. 
Referring to the hero as a '^dretful reckless 
goat." 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 155 

Then he told the brisk reporters all the grim and 
grisly tale, 
And the deed was dressed in language in a 
way to bring some fame. 
But alas for human glory, the galoot who brought 
the story. 
Remembered all the details, but forgot the 
fellow's name. 



Have you ever heard Seboomook roaring at you 
in the night, 
With her champing jaws a-frothing in a word- 
less howl of hate? 
'Tis a fierce vociferation to compel our admira- 
tion. 
For the chap who struck that rugged blow, 
cross-countered thus by Fate. 

When he lunged his pole at Death, 
When the river sucked his breath, 
Seboomook gravely listened when he screamed 
his humble name; 
For the honor of a foe 
She would have the people know. 
But she vainly dins her message in the deafened 
ear of Fame. 



156 UP IN MAINE 

HA'NTS OF THE KINGDOM OF SPRUCE 

The sheeted ghosts of moated grange 
And misty wraiths are passing strange ; 
The gibbering spooks and elfin freaks 
And cackling witches' maudlin squeaks — 



— They have terrified the nations, and have laid 
the bravest low, 

But intimidate a woodsman up in Maine ? Why, 
bless you, no ! 

Merely mistj^ apparitions or some sad ancestral 
spook 

Serve to terrify a maiden or to warn a death- 
marked duke. 

But the P. I. scoffs their terrors, though he'll 
never venture loose 

'Mongst the ha'nts that roam the woodlands in 
the weird domains of Spruce. 

— He'll mock the fears of mystic and he'll scorn 
the bookish tales 

Of the fearsome apparitions of the past, but 

courage fails 
In the night when he awakens, all a-shiver in 

his bunk, 
And with ear against the logging hears the 

steady, muffled thunk 
Of the hairy fists of monsters, beating there in 

grisly play, 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 15T 

— Horrid things that stroll o' night-times, never, 

never seen by day. 
For he knows that though the spectres of the 

storied past are vain. 
There is true and ghostly ravage in the forest 

depths of Maine. 



For even in these days P. I.'s shake 

At the great Swamp Swogon of Brassua Lake. 

When it blitters and glabbers the long night 

through. 
And shrieks for the souls of the shivering crew. 
And all of us know of the witherlick 
That prowls by the shore of the Cup-sup-tic. 
Of the Side Hill Ranger whose eyeballs gleam 
When the moon hangs gibbous over Abol 

stream ; 

— Of the Dolorous Demon that moans and calls 
Through the mists of Abol-negassis falls. 

And many a woodsman has felt his bunk 
Tossed by the Phantom of Sourdna-hunk. 
There's the Giant Spook who ha'nted Lane's 
Old wangan camp and rended chains 

— Great iron links of the snubbing cable — 

As though they were straw — who was even 

able 
To twist the links in a mighty mat 
With which he bent the forest flat 



158 UP IN MAINE 

From Nahma-kanta to Depsiconneag 

— Acres and acres — league after league ; 
Striding abroad from peak to dale 

And laying on with his mighty flail. 

Oh, fie for the shade of the manored hall, 
A fig for a Thing in a grave-creased pall, 

— For wraiths that flitter and flutter and sigh, 
With flabby limbs and the sunken eye ! 

The woodsman recks not ye, frail ghosts. 

But he knows and he bows to the deep wood's 

hosts. 
Who sound their coming with giant breath. 
Who mark their passing with storm and death. 
Who shriek through blow-downs and howl o'er 

lakes, 

— And he hides and trembles, he shivers and 
shakes 

When he hears the Desperate Demons loose 
In the weird dominions of grim King Spruce. 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 159 

THE HERO OF THE COONSKIN CAP 

When the blaze leaps forth from the camp's 
great hearth, 

And the fitful shadows come and go ; 
When the ruddy beam lights the deacon-seat 

And the silent faces in a row ; 
As the storm-gust drags at the sighing eaves 

And moans at the shuddering window-pane. 
Some droning voice from a shadowy bank 

Intones a song to the wind's long strain. 
And like the soughing, ebbing blast 

The gusty chorus bursts and swells ; 
And then one single, sighing voice 

Drones plaintively the tale it tells. 
They're simple songs, they're homely songs. 

And yet they cling in heart and brain, 

Those songs of the darkling forest depths. 

These songs of the lumber woods of Maine. 

There's the song of home and the song of love. 

And the lilt of battle, bold and free ; 
There's the song of the axe in the ringing wood, 

And the sighing song of the distant sea. 
Yet oft when the choruses are stilled 

Some honest woodsman's voice can wake 
A tender thrill with the homely song 

Of a nameless hero of Moosehead Lake. 



160 UP IN MAINE 

A hero in leggings, he volunteered 

— When the treacherous ice lay black as loam 
In the melting spring — to risk his life 

And bring to others the news from home. 
He bore the mail for the lumber camp, 

The missives for many an anxious man 
Who toiled for the ones he loved so well. 

In the wilds of the far Socatean. 
He'd fingered each as he studied the names 

And sorted the letters with kindly care ; 
While with honest heart of a friend he guessed 

At the news that the precious notes might 
bear. 

There was one for Kane, and the last had said 

That his little girl was sorely ill — 
Poor man, he had worried the whole long week! 

— And here was one for the Bluenose-Will, 
Who had left a sweetheart to come to Maine, 

And had looked for a line in a homesick way ; 
And here were a couple from Henry's wifef 
— And one bore "Forward without delay!" 
A tiny message to " Pa John Booth " 

Had a cross to show where a rousing smack 
Had been pressed on the paper ; and here, alas, 

Was a letter fringed with a sombre black. 
Freighted with sorrow or bringing the smiles, 

Fresh from the homes so far away, 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 161 

He tucked them all in his coon-skin cap 
And breasted the sleet of the dreary day. 

No one knewihow it came about. 

No man witnessed the fight for breath, 

When the cruel clutch of the great black lake 
Reached up and dragged him down to death. 

But we always knew that his fiercest strength 

Was spent in the supreme flash of life 
When he, poor wanderer, thought alone 

Of the news for others from home and wife. 
For, as far on the edge of the broken ice 

As his arm could reach, when he sank and 
died, 
We found the worn old coon-skin cap 

With the letters carefully tucked inside. 



162 UP IN MAINE 

A HAIL TO THE HUNTER 

Oh, we're getting under cover, for the " sport '' is 
on the way, 

— Pockets bulge with ammunition, and he's 
coming down to slay ; 

All his cartridges are loaded and his trigger's on 

the "half," 
And he'll bore the thing that rustles, from a 

deer to Jersey calf. 
He will shoot the foaming rapids, and he'll shoot 

the yearling bull. 
And the farmer in the bushes — why, he'll fairly 

get pumped full. 
For the gunner is in earnest, he is coming down 

to kill, 

— Shoot you first and then inquire if he hurt 
you — yes, he will ! 

For the average city feller he has big game on 

the brain. 
And imagines in October there is nothing else in 

Maine ! 
Therefore some absorbed old farmer cutting corn 

or pulling beans 
Gets most mightily astonished with a bullet in 

his jeans. 
So, O neighbor, scoot for cover or get out your 

armor plate, 



4 



DRIVE, CAMP, AND WANGAN 163 

— Johnnie's got his little rifle and is swooping 
on the State. 

Oh, we're learning, yes, we're learning, and I'll 
warn you now, my son. 

If you really mean to bore us you must bring a 
bigger gun. 

For the farmers have decided they will take no 
further chance. 

And progressive country merchants carry armor- 
plated pants ; 

— Carry shirts of chain-plate metal, lines of coats 
all bullet-proof. 

And the helmets they are selling beat a Knight 

of Malta's " roof." 
So I reckon that the farmers can proceed to get 

their crops. 
Yes, and chuckle while the bullet raps their 

trouser seats and stops ; 
And the hissing double-B shot as they criss-cross 

over Maine 
Will excite no more attention than the patter of 

the rain. 
And the calf will fly a signal and the Jersey 

bull a sign. 
And the horse a painted banner, reading " Hoss ; 

Don't Shoot; He's Mine ! " 
And every fowl who wanders from the safety of 

the pen 



164 UP IN MAINE 

Will be taught to cackle shrilly, " Please don't 
plug me ; I'm a hen." 

Now with all these due precautions we are ready 

for the gang, 
We'll endure the harmless tumult of the rifles' 

crack and bang. 
For we're glad to have you with us — shoot the 

landscape full of holes ; 
We will back our brand-new armor for to save 

our precious souls. 
O you feller in the city, those 'ere woods is full 

of fun, 
We've got on our iron trousers — so come up 

and bring your gun ! 



BOSSES 



BOSSES 16T 

THEM OLD RAZOOS AT TOPSHAM 
TRACK 

Won't you poke your buzzin' stop-watch, 

Daddy Time, and click 'er back 
To the days of spider high-wheels on the 

dinky Topsham track ? 
When they raced there in October for per- 

taters, corn, and oats — 
Sometimes paid the purse in shotes — 
Drivers wore their buff'ler coats, 
And the weather was so juicy that the boys 

would take a vote 
As to which would drag the better, suh, a sulky 
or a boat. 
Still 'twas fun, when the sun 
Got the moppin' bus'ness done. 
And the field went off a-skatin', half the pelters 

on the run. 
There was 'Liza, Old Keturah Ann, and Dough- 
nut Boy and Pat, 
Their pedigrees was barnyard, but we didn't 

care for that ; 
So hooray ! So hooroo ! Oh, ye ought to see 

'em climb. 
They was racers, suh, from 'way back — but no 
matter 'bout the time ! 
There was goers in that pack — 
Look at Toggle-jointed Jack 



168 UP IN MAINE 

With an action like a windmill, but the critter 
he could rack ! 
And I'd like to have him back, 
For I tell you, bub, I stack 
On the high-wheel, razoo-races of the good old i 
Topsham track. 

Oh, you oughter seen the send-offs, and you 

oughter seen the tricks ! 
For the stretch was chock-a-blocko when they 

scored 'em down by six. 
And the starter he would whang-o on a dented 

strip of tin. 
But the drivers never minded less he cussed the 

gang like sin. 
The hoss-whips that they carried reached away 
beyond the manes, 
And they larruped 'em with chains — 
Tried to lift 'em by the reins. 
'Twas muscle, suh, that won the race in them 

old days — not brains ! 
And you'd think to see the sawin' and the 

jerkin' and the h'ists. 
The boys they was a-usin' partent webbin's 

made of j'ists. 
Their elbows flapped like flyin' and they yow- 

wowed through the dust. 
And 'twarn't through lack of hoUerin' that ev'ry 

man warn't fust. 




HOSSES 169 

'Twas " Hi-i yah, cut the corners ! " and " Hi-i 

yoop, take the pole ! " 
" Don't ye keep me in this pocket — let me out 

there, darn yer soul ! " 
" Gimme room there ! don't ye pinch me or I'll 
bust yer blasted wheel ! " 
" Hi, you sucker, that's a steal ! " 
" That's a low-down trick, to squeal ! " 
" Oh, ye want some trouble, do ye ? Wal, con- 

sarn yer harslet, peel ! " 
It was tetchy, mister, tetchy, to go sassin' on 'em 

back. 
When the crowd got interested at the good old 
Topsham track. 

There was Savage — Solly Savage — drivin' 

Adeline Success — 
He had speed to sell at auction, but they bribed 
the cuss, I guess — 
For he pulled her tight and good — 
Pulled her settin' — then he stood. 
Jest got up and braced his feet, suh, and he 

pulled her all he could. 
But the blamed old mare was fussy, wasn't 

posted on the deal, 
H'isted up her skeeter-duster and let out one 

mighty squeal. 
She was leadin' of 'em easy on the back stretch 
at the turn, 



ITO UP IN MAINE 

And there wasn't no mistakin' that the race and 
heat were her'n. 
Ginger, ginger ! She could go ! 
When she didn't stub her toe, 
Warn't a horse in all the county stood a show 

suh, stood a show ! 
Sol was madder'n snakes in hayin' — had a string 

of catnip fits. 
Just unfastened both the traces and she hauled 
him by the bits. 
And that rank old Adeline 
She come snortin' 'crost the line 
Least a dozen lengths a leader, and they soaked 

old Sol a fine. 
Then the feller that had bribed him played tat- 
too on Solly's face. 
And took back the dollar-fifty that he'd give him 

for the race ; 
But the boys they licked the feller. Solly got 

his money back. 
For we stood for honest dealing at the good old 
Topsham track. 

Now come join me, all old timers, — hip, hooray 

and tiger, too ! 
For the high-wheel days at Topsham and the 

good old-time razoo — 
For the days of spider sulkies and the days of 

solid fun. 



HOSSES 171 

When we had a dozen knock-downs 'fore the 
i0 race could be begun; 

When 'twas ^' Huddup, Uncle Eli," and " H' 
along there, John, or bust ; " 
And the man that finished fust. 
Though he argued and he cussed, 
Might not always get decisions — 'twas accordin' 

to the dust ; 
And 'twas therefore kind of needful, suh, right 

after ev'ry heat, 
To have another fight or so to settle who had 
beat; 
But they never left a grudge. 
Even when they licked the judge. 
And we wasn't all teetotal, still we went it light 

on " budge," 
For we never took no stronger than some good 

New England rum — 
Jest a mild and pleasant bev'rage — why, the 
deacons they took some ! 
Then there wasn't pedigrees, 
And no chin-kerbumping knees,' 
And an av'rage field would manage jest to keep 
ahead the breeze. 

But come join me, ye old-timers, in this pledge 

and one hurrah, 
For the spanking, wide-hoofed pelters of the old 
days of " Hi yah-h-h," 



172 UP IN MAINE 

For a feller kinder feels 
That he'd go without his meals 
Jest to hear some more kiwhoopin' from the old- 
time trottin' spiels. 
When the wind was in the drivers — nowadays it's 

in the wheels. 
When the tang was in the weather on those 

autumn afternoons, 
And the band got kind of dreamy in those good 

old-fashioned tunes. 
Oh, 'twas awful good to set there on the sunny 

side the stand, 
And to have your girl a-smilin' and a-snugglin', 

hand in hand ; 
And to hear her, when you mentioned getting 

started pretty soon, 
Whisper, blushin', ''What's the hurry? There 

will be a lovely moon ! " 
Ah, there's moisture on my eyelids and my voice 

is gettin' hoarse. 
But 'tis prob'ly jest the mem'ry of the dust of 

that old course. 
Oh, Daddy Time, if somehow you could only 

click your watch 
And let a feller start again a race he's made a 

botch, 
I wouldn't ask no better place to start my life 

anew 





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HOSSES 173 

Than on that stand that afternoon beside that 
girl I knew, 
With my arm behind her back, 
And a hidden, bashful smack 
To sweeten all the popcorn balls we munched 
at Topsham track. 



174 UP IN MAINE 

TO HIM WHO DRIV THE STAGE 

Here's a lyric for the man who's "druv' the 
stage," 
For the hero of the webbin's and the whip ; 
Who has faced the wind and weather, fingers 
calloused by the leather. 
And in twenty years has never lost a trip. 

Here's a tribute to the sway-back, spotted hoss, 

Who has struggled up the stony, gullied hills ; 
And his dorsal corrugations show the nature of 
his rations, 
— When he stops, he has to lean against the 
thills. 

Here's obituary notice of the stage. 

Chief of hopeless and dilapidated wrecks ; 

With the cracked enamel awning, and its cush- 
ions ripped and yawning. 
And the body bumping down upon the "- ex." 

Here's alas and oh, the ancient " buff 'ler robe," 
With the baldness of a golden-wedding 
groom ; 
When the rain and snow descended, then some 
wondrous smells were blended, 
Till the stage was scented very like a tomb. 



HOSSES 175 

Here's a word for all the weary miles he 
ploughed, 
When the drifts had piled the stage-road 
mountain high, 
When the night shut down around him and the 
north wind sought and found him. 
And the tempest chilled his blood and blurred 
his eye. 

There were only country letters in the bags. 
And the bags were lank, and yet his word was 
" Must." 
And he felt as if the nation knew his fierce 
determination 
That he'd have the mail sacks through on time 
or bust. 

Here's rebuke to those contractors who have 
skinned 
The stipends of our Uncle Sam's star routes, 
Till the men who drive the stages hardly get 
enough in wages 
To keep their little shavers' feet in boots. 

Here's a lyric, then, for him who drives the stage ; 

When you ride behind his ragged back, don't 

frown. 

But endure the bang and slamming, for the 

man who's earned the damning 

Is the contract-sharp who bid the wages down. 



176 UP IN MAINE 

HE BACKED A BLAMED OLD HORSE 

The neighbors came a-nosing 'round and said the 
horse could trot 

— He oughter up and killed him then, right 
there upon the spot; 

A-killed him, yas, and tanned his hide and made 
it into boots, 

Then worn 'em out a-kicking 'round them neigh- 
borly galoots 

Who set the bee to buzzing under Ezry Booker's 
hat, 

And filled him up and chucked him full of non- 
sense such as that 

He'd got a hoss 'twas bound to make his ever- 
lasting pile. 

And what he got to do, of course, was handle 
him in style ; 

That he must bandage up his legs and figger on 
his feed. 

And give him reg'lar exercise and work him out 
for speed. 

His knees, his neck, his breast, his thighs, the 
way he lugged his head. 

And all his other symptoms looked to " speed," 
the neighbors said. 

So Ezry he just sucked it in, as child-like as 
could be, 



HOSSES 17T 

— It cost him thirteen dollars to look up the 
pedigree. 

Then one day down to Laneses store he ribbled 

off a mess 
Of names that struck your Uncle Dud as so much 

foolishness. 
''I've traced him back," so Ezry said, ''to Mor- 
gan blood 'nd Drew," 
To what's-his-name and this and that, and which 

and t'other, too. 
And Ezry banged the counter, just excited as 

could be, 
A-arguing out the knots and kinks in that there 

pedigree. 
Land sakes ! He couldn't seem to think of 

nothing but that plug : 

— Neglected work, let slide his farm, went crazy 
as a bug. 

But there ! The neighbors stood around and 

said to go ahead, 
And Ezra like a blamed old fool just swallowed 

all they said. 
Ef they'd turned to and burned his barn 'twould 

been a prison criine, 
But 'twould have been a better thing for Ezry 

ev'ry time. 
He could have got insurance then, but 'twas a 

total loss 



178 UP IN MAINE 

When they torched Ezry up to back 
A Blamed 
Old 

Hoss! 

Of course he had to put that horse in som6 good 

tramer's hands, 
And trainers, as the man who's tried deereckly 

understands, 
Ain't driving just to take the air, for scenery or 

for health, 
But sort of grab a feller's leg and milk him for 

his wealth. 
And there were blankets, straps, and girths, and 

bandages and boots ; 
Pnoomatic sulkies, pads, and shoes, and hoods 

and stable suits; 
And lotions, too, and liniments — the best of 

hay and oats. 
And Lord knows what of this and that for trot- 
ters' backs and throats ! 
Then came the entrance fees, of course, and 

travelling expense. 
For Ezry lugged that trotter round, and didn't 

have the sense 
To know when he was fairly licked, but always 

would persist 
That " that air hoss another year is going in the 

list ! " 



HOSSES 179 

The trainer said he'd have him there ; the neigh- 
bors thought so, too ; 
So Ezry pulled his pocketbook and said he'd see 

him through. 
So 'round the circuit went the boss and, though 

'tis sad to tell, 
''The Flying Dutchman" didn't fly — he never 

got a smell. 
And when he'd come a-puffing in behind the 

whole blamed crowd 
Then Ezry swore and shook his fist, and argued 

'round, and vowed 
That all the rest was down on him and had, 

without a doubt. 
Just pooled together in a scheme to shut The 

Dutchman out. 
The driver said so, anyway, and then, you know, 

a few 
Good neighbors took him out one side and said 

they thought so too. 
And so — but land, it's plain enough how Ezry's 

money went 
', — He wound up his race-hoss career without a 

blasted cent. 
What's more, he ain't the only one who's sunk 

ills little pot 
In fubbing 'round from track to track with 

horses that can't trot. 



180 UP IN MAINE 

— He ain't the only man in Maine whose ever- 
lasting curse 
Has been some darn-fool neighbors, and his itch 

to win a purse. 
And, as I've said, if they'd turned to, and burnt 

his barn instead 
Of cracking up that hoss so much and turning 

Ezry's head. 
He could have got insurance then, but 'twas a 

total loss 
When they torched Ezry up to back 
A Blamed 
Old 

Hoss ! 



BOSSES 181 

B. BROWN — HOSS ORATOR 

I've heerd of Demosthenes — b'longed down in 

Greece, 
— And Cicero, too ! 
But 'course, never knew 
A great deal about 'em except through my niece, 
Who's tended the 'cademy, — lets on to know 
'Bout most of the critters who lived years ago, 
— Who'd talk to a standstill the chaps of their 

day 
With a broadside of words like a gatling, they 

say. 
And folks knuckle down, and praise up, and 

kow-tow 
To those hefty old tongue-lashing chaps even 

now. 
So I'm ready for brickbats, and hollers, and howls, 
From the folks of the schools, and from hide- 
bound old owls. 
When I shin the high flag-staff of Fame to tear 

down 
All colors that flop there for rival renown. 
And string up the banner of Bennington Brown. 

Don't think I'll assert 

What he knew ever hurt ! 

He was mostly considered an ornery squirt. 



182 UP IN MAINE 

He traded old bosses, and cattle, and such, 
And the sayin' 'round town was : " Oh, Brown, 

he ain't much ! " 
But I read t'other day, in a volyum called 

" Hints," 
That a speaker is gauged by his gifts to convince. 
So I stand on that statement and solemnly swear 
That as a star-actor convincer, I'd dare 
Back Bennington Brown up against the best 

man 
That ever tongue wrassled, grab holts, catch as 

can. 
Give Cicero Pointer, Directum, or Hanks, 
And Brown an old pelter with wobbly shanks, 
— Just leave 'em an hour, no odds, a clear field, 
No matter how Cicero sputtered and spieled, 
I'll bet he would find himself talked to a stop, 
And Brown would unload the old rip, even swap ! 

I can see how he'd look 
When he carefully took 

Old Cicby the gallus with "- come-along " hook 
Of that gnurly forefinger. And there Cic would 

stand, 
For he wouldn't be yankin' away from that hand. 
Unless in his desperate efforts to skip 
Cic dodged from his toga, and gave Brown the 
slip. 



HOSSES 183 

And it's likely that Brown would talk something 

like this : 
" I ain't at all anxious to shift with you, Cic. 
Your hoss, I'll admit, has got plenty of speed, 
But you know, Cic, jou know that he ain't what 

you need. 
Outside of a show piece to stand in the barn. 
That hoss he ain't worth, Cic, a tinker's gol- 

darn. 
What you want is that hoss of mine — want him 

blame bad. 
He don't need no whip, crackers, cudgel, or gad. 
'Thout strap, boot, or toeweights, he's gone out 

and showed 
His quarters in thirty. He stands lots of road. 
And I swow I dunno what I^m sellin' him for, 
— I need him myself. But I'll sell ! Have a 

chaw ? 
And as I was sayin', he's just what you want ; — 
Oh, yes, have to own he's a leetle dite gaunt ! 
Been a-drivin' him hard, for he'll stand lots of 

work, 
Never had a sick day, never shows the least 

quirk. 
He's young : look yourself ; jest you roll up his 

Up; 
By the way, ever smile ? I've some stuff on my 

hip. 



184 UP IN MAINE 

Now as I was sayin'" — and on, and so on, 
Till Cicero'd put his suspenders in pawn, 
Hand oyer his steed for a wind-broken brute, 
And sling in some golden sestertia to boot. 

I tell you again, 
That of all of the men 

Who can slat the King's English, I swear by 
old Ben ! 
And you'll never appreciate half of my praise 
Till you've stood there yourself in the beller 

and blaze 
Of his thirteen-inch barker, and fust thing you 

know 
Discover you've bought an old bone yard or so, 
I hardly expect, O ye hurrying throng, 
Ye'U bow to mj hero, applaud my rude song. 
But sling, if ye will, all your bouquets and praise 
At the cut-and-dried speakers of pod-auger days, 
I'll go by myself and I'll tenderly crown 
With bay the bald brows of old Bennington.. 
Brown. 



HOSSES 185 

*'JEST A LIFT" 

Feller was far as the foot of the hill in one of 

those boggy places, 
Had a first-class team, 
As strong as a beam, 
But the feller had busted his traces ; 
And the feller gave up when he saw he was 

stuck. 
He borrowed a chaw and consarned his luck, 
— Admitted he didn't know what to do ; 
Sat down on a bank and looked so blue 
He worried the people that passed, and they 
Just turned their noses the other way. 
Old Ammi Simmons muttered that he 
Was a dite afraid of his whiffle-tree ; 
It was slivered some, " and there warn't much 

doubt 
'Twould bust if he pulled that feller out.'" 
And Ira Dorsey, regretful and smug. 
Would have helped had he brought his heavier 

tug. 
So he simply beamed a bright " good day " 
And clucked to his team and rode away. 
So thus they passed for an hour or two ; 
Many not noticing, while a few 
Assured him they'd like to help him out 
" If the rigging they had was only stout." 



186 UP IN MAINE 

Feller had thought he was up a stump, when 
along drove Ivory Keller ; 

Saw the sunken hub, 

Yelled, "What's the troub? 
Don't ye want a lift there, feller? " 
And the feller said that he did, you bet, 
But said he had begged while he'd set and set, 
And he hadn't discovered a single man 
Who'd give him a boost with an extra span. 
" Why," Ivory said, " that's jest my holt. 
That off boss there ain't more'n a colt. 
And it's hardly an extry pulling pair, 
But it's yourn for what it's worth, I swear. 
For I've got a home-made sort of a rule 

— Won't kick a cripple nor sass a fool, 
And when I find that a feller's stuck 

— A side-tracked chap down on his luck — 
Why, bless you, neighbor, in jest about 
Two shakes of a sheep's tail I yank him out." 
And the very next thing that the feller knew 
Old Ivory busted a chain or two, 

But the horse and the colt and the gay old man 
Bent to the job till the clogged wheels ran, 

— Tugged and buckled with hearty will 
Till the cart rolled over the tough old hill. 
Then the feller begged him to take some pay, 
But the old man chuckled and shoved him 

away; 



HOSSES 187 

'^ Why, bub, see here," said Ivory Keller, 
" I'm a tollable busy son of a gun, 
And this is the way I squeeze in fun, 
— Grab in same's this and help a feller." 



188 UP IN MAINE 

BART OF BRIGHTON 

'Tis the tale of Bart of Brighton — meaning 
Brighton up in Maine ; 
It's the tale of Uncle Bart, sir, and his racker- 
gaited mare ; 
I have toned it down a little where the language 
was profane, 
But the rest is as he told it — this remarkable 

affair. 
It is very wrong to swear ; 
Bart admits the fact — but there ! 
Times occur when human nature simply is 
obliged to ''r'ar." 



'' It's all along o' givin' lifts to Uncle Isr'el 

Clark, 
— His folks don't like him stubbin' round the 

village after dark, — 
And old Mis' Clark has asked of folks that see 

him on the road 
To take him in and bring him home, if 'tain't too 

much a load. 
The day this 'ere aifair come off I'd took in 

Uncle Pease, 
With a pail of new molasses that he hugged be- 
tween his knees. 
We see old Clark ahead of us, a-lugging home 

a gun. 



HOSSES 189 

Says I to Pease, 'Now brace yer hat : we'll have 
a leetle fun.' 

' Set in behind, old Clark,' I says. ' Hop in be- 
hind,' says I. 

' Prowidin' these 'ere tugs don't bust I'll take 
you like a fly.' 

He piled aboard, s'r, master quick, there warn't 
no need to tease. 

And there he sot, the gun straight up, the butt 
between his knees. 

''I'll tell you 'bout that mare of mine — the 
more, you holler ' whoa,' 

I've larnt the whelp to clench her teeth, and 
h'ist her tail — and go ! 

And when we got clus' down to Clark's I thought 
for jest a sell 

I'd make believe we'd run away. So I com- 
menced to yell, 

And old man Pease he hugged his knees and 
gaffled to his pail. 

And now, my boy, purraps you think that turn- 
out didn't sail ! 

He hugged his gun, did Uncle Clark, and set and 
hollered ' Oh ! ' 

While I kep' nudgin' Uncle Pease and bellered, 
' Durn ye, whoa ! ' 



190 UP IN MAINE 

"I larfed, suh, like a kmytick, I larfed and 

thought 'twas fun 
To look around and see old Clark a-hangin' to 

his gun, 
For he was scart plum nigh to death, and so was 

Uncle Pease, 
Who doubled clus' above that pail he clenched 

between his knees. 
' But while I larfed I clean forgot the Jackson 

corderoy. 
And when we struck that on the run, we got 

our h'ist, my boy. 
Old Clark went up jest like a ball and, ijext the 

critter knowed, 
Come whizzlin' down, s'r, gun and all, starn- 

fust there in the road. 
And when the gun- butt struck the ground, ker- 

whango, off she went, 

— Both barrels of her, all to onct, and then — 
wal, 'twas — hell-bent ! 

The off-rein bust, the wheels r'ared up — the old 

mare give a heave, 
That runaway was on for sure — there warn't 

no make-believe ; 
With toother rein I geed the mare up-hill to'ards 

Clarkses yard, 

— We struck the doorstep, struck her fair, and 
struck her mighty hard ! 



BOSSES 191 

And long as Lord shall give me breath I shan't 

forget the eye 
That old Aunt Clark shot out at me as we went 

whoopin' by. 
Then I went out and Pease went out and things 

got kinder blue 
— 'Twas sev'ral minits by the clock 'fore this 

old cock come to. 
And there the old mare'd climbed the fence and 

stood inside the gate, 
With eyes stuck out and ears stuck back and 

head and tail up straight. 
And from the way she looked at me 'twas master 

evident 
She wasn^t catchin' on to what this celebration 

meant. 
And I was clutchin' jest about two feet of one 

the reins, 
While Uncle Pease was dodderin' round, a-yellin' 

* Blood and brains ! ' 
For, bless my soul, when he had lit he'd run 

himself head-fust 
Right down in that molasses pail ; — he thought 

his head had bust ! 
And that the stuff a-runnin' down and gobbed 

acrost his face 
Was quarts of gore, and so old Pease had clean 

give up his casco 



192 UP IN MAINE 

And there he stood like some old hen a-drippin' 

in the rain, 
And hollered stiddy, ' Blood and brain, I'm 

dead ; oh, blood and brain ! ' 
Old Uncle Clark was on his back, a-listening to 

the fuss. 
And wonderin' whuther that old gun had 

murdered him or us. 

" Now that's the way the thing come off. Best 

is," concluded Bart, 
"They warn't nobody hurt a mite: three-fifty 

fixed the cart." 
But as he spoke he sought to hide a poultice 

with his hat 
And curtly said, " Oh, jest a tunk ! you see, 

Aunt Clark done that." 



'Tis the tale of Bart of Brighton — mean- 
ing Brighton up in Maine, 
— It's the tale of Uncle Bart, sir, and his 
racker-gaited mare; 
I have toned it down a little where the language 
was profane, 
But the rest is as he told it, this remarkable 
affair. 



GOIN' T' SCHOOL 



GOIN' T' SCHOOL 195 

THE PAIL I LUGGED TO SCHOOL 

I know my confession is homely, but Yankees 

are Yankees clean through, 
Their dollars make shells like a turtle's, but 

their hearts, my dear fellow, are true 
To the dear, sacred days of their childhood, and 

luxury loses its charm : 
— The only good things are the old things to 

the fellow brought up on the farm. 
And I'd trade all the cheer of a banquet, I'd 

" swop " them, as grandpap would say. 
For the tang of the infinite gusto that came to 

me, when, after play, 
I lifted the battered tin cover and squared my 

brown arms to assail 
The grub that this hearty young shaver had 

carried to school in his pail. 

God bless her, that darling old mother! She 

cherished the honest conceit 
That the groundwork of boyish good morals is, 

first of all, plenty to eat. 
And though I went barefoot in summer, with 

trousers cut over from Jim's, 
We scampered to school every morning with 

dinner pails filled to their brims. 



196 UP IN MAINE 

There were doughnuts, both holed ones and 

twisters, and always a bottle of cream, 
And jell cakes and tarts and all such like — oh, 

how the kids' eyes used to gleam ! 
I pitied the poor little shavers who slunk to a 

corner to eat. 
Who brought only bread and potatoes and never 

had anything sweet ; 
And some carried grub in their pockets, and hid 

with a child's bitter shame 
To choke down the crust and the cooky before 

some rude fun-maker came. 
But out of such manhood's successes of which 

I've a right to be proud 
There never was one I've uncovered, with such 

a delight, to the crowd 
As that pail with its bountiful dinner, each 

cake and each jelly-tipped tart 
A dumb but an eloquent voucher of a thoughtful 

and true mother-heart. 
And, neighbors, from things I have noted, I 

think it's a pretty good rule 
To size up a mother's devotion by the grub her 

child carries to school. 
Those savors that float from my childhood dull 

all the delights of my board ; 
The good things from mother's old kitchen my 

dollars can never afford. 



GOIN' T' SCHOOL 19T 

And I'd trade all these delicate dishes — a clean 

unconditional sale — 
For the tang of the infinite gusto from the depths 

of that old dinner pail. 



198 UP IN MAINE 

THE PADDYWHACKS 

Mother says it's something fearful — way this 

pesky young one acts, 
And she's called the Johnson children by the 

name of " Paddywhacks." 
And she keeps a-givin' orders that I musn't have 

'em round; 
But she thinks that Satan's in me, for she says 

I'm always bound 
To go mixing with 'em somehow when she lets 

me out to play ; 
And you bet I'm going to see 'em if I have to 
run away. 
I'll never wear them blamed dude clothes 
Nor boots with patent leather toes. 
I like to stomp and scnff and kick 
And holler round. It makes me sick 
To have that Reynolds youngster call. 
He's primped up like a big wax doll. 
My mother says he's just too sweet, 
He always keeps his clothes so neat, 
And wishes I'd spruce up a bit; 
What ! Look like that ? Well, I guess nit f 
— They've dirtj^ mugs and ragged backs. 
But just give me them Paddywhacks. 



GOIN' T' SCHOOL 199 

They can catch ye lots of suckers — know the 

brook and shortest cut ; 
They have got a robber's dungeon and a nice 

browse Injun hut. 
They can scrape ye lots of sly ver — juicy stuff 

from little pines, 
They can make a willow whistle, and they're 

posted on the signs 
Of woodchucks, coons, and squirrels ; and they 

own a brindle houn'. 
And they get to going barefoot first of any boys 
in town. 
That's the stuff — oh, that's the stuff, 
Let a kid kick up and scuff ! 
Not go round with mouth all screwed 
Goody, like that Reynolds dude. 
Say, I'll push him once, if he 
Comes a-making mouths at me. 
Yah, yah ! See them corkscrew curls ! 
That's right, let him play with girls. 
Let him wear his ruffled shirt 
— Give me one that won't show dirt. 
„ I'm the chap, you bet, that stacks 
Up 'long-side them Paddywhacks. 



200 UP IN MAINE 

THAT MAYBASKET FOR MABEL FRY 

Mother rigged the little basket, for I'd teased a 
day or so, 

— I was just a little shaver, and 'twas years and 
years ago, — 

And I blushed while I was teasing ; I was young, 

so mother said, 
To be running 'round with baskets when I ought 

to be in bed. 
But she trimmed me up the basket and she asked 

me whom 'twas for; 
Ah, I didn't dare to tell her ; thought I'd better 

hold my jaw. 
For I wanted it for Mabel, not for Minnie on the 

Hill; 

— For a maid in rags and tatters, not a maid in 
lace and frill. 

Minnie rode behind her ponies; Mabel had a 

wooden cart. 
But to Mabel went the homage of my foolish 

boyish heart. 
True, her gown was frayed and ragged, and her 

folks were sort of low. 
And her brothers swore like demons, and they 

tagged where'er we'd go. 
And my father always scolded me and drove 

them all away 



O ft) 

03 'P 



CD P 
















GOIN' T' SCHOOL 201 

Whene'er they followed Mabel if I asked her up 

to play. 
But I saw not Mabel's tatters ; for I loved her 

sun-browned face, 
And I'd lick thelkid that didn't say she was the 
handsomest girl in the place. 
'Tis a tricksy prank that memory plays 
Taking me back to those early days ; 
But the purest affection the heart can hold 
Is the honest love of a nine-year-old. 
It isn't checked by the five-barred gate 
Of worldly prudence and real estate. 
And that, my friend, was the reason why 
I hung my basket to Mabel Fry, 
She'd a tattered dress, and a pink great toe 
Stuck out through her shoe, but — I loved 

her so — • 
Though that was years and years ago. 

I sat down and looked at mother while she 

trimmed the pasteboard box, 
While she crimped the crinkly paper till it fluffed 

like curly locks ; 
Till she fastened on the streamers, red and 

yellow, white and blue. 
And she held it up and twirled it, saying, " Sonny, 
, will that do?" 



202 UP IN MAINE 

Would it do ? It was a beauty ! 'Twas a gem 

in basket art ; 
And I piled it full of candy, put on top a big 

red heart. 
Then as soon as dusk could hide me I escaped 

my mother's eyes, 
And I hung the grand creation on the door-latch 

of the Frys. 
How my youthful limbs were shaking ! how my 

dizzy noddle rocked I 
And my heart was pounding louder than my 

knuckles when I knocked. 
So she caught me at the corner, for you see I 

didn't fly, 
— Might have been I was so frightened ; then 

perhaps I didn't try. 
When I swung around to meet her, neither of 

us dared to stir. 
Mabel stood and watched the sidewalk and I 

stood and gawked at her, 
While those little imps of brothers gobbled every 

blessed mite 
Of the candy in that basket — Mabel didn't get a 

bite. 
But I saved the little basket, gave each kid a 

hearty cuff, 
And I tried to comfort Mabel ; told her she was 

sweet enough, 



GOIN' T' SCHOOL 203 

— Said she didn't need the candy ; but my little 

Mabel sighed, 
Blushed and whispered that she wondered how 

I knew — I hadn't tried — 
To-day — to-day from a long-gone May 
This tricksy memory strays my way. 
Just for a moment I close my eyes 
And see that cracked old door of Fry's. 
And my heart is brushed, as the noon day 

trees 
Are touched with the whisp of the strolling 

breeze. 
Alas, that the heart mayn't always hold 
The honest love of the nine-year-old. 
I haven't a doubt you're dreaming now 
Of some frank maid with an honest brow 
Who chose you out for she loved you so, 
When Worth got " Yes," and Wealth got 

"No." 
But that was years and years ago. 



204 UP IN MAINE i 

THE MYSTIC BAND 

I've joined the orders that came our way, 

— Been sort of a " jiner," as one would say, — 
And IVe bucked the goat, and trudged the sands, 
And taken the oaths in most secret bands, 
Till now at last I seldom slip 
On test or password, sign or grip. 
And every day when I walk the street 
I give the signs to the men I meet. 
There's the S. of T. and the K. of P. 
And the League of the Order of Liberty ; 
Masons and Odd Fellows string along. 
Thicker than flies in the moving throng. 
Till it seems that every fellow could 
Give you a sign of a brotherhood. 
Oh, I like to meet them, every one. 
From the Daughter of Peace to a Son of a Gun. 
But I can't quite feel the same delight 
As I used to when, some summer night, 
I'd take a few of the high degrees 
In the O. K. K. B. W. P's. 

We had no lodge-room with locks and bars 

— Our hall was the dome 'neath the winking 
stars ; 

No lofty dais and tufted throne, 
No crown or symbol or altar stone, 



GOIN' T' SCHOOL 205 

No velvet carpets or flashing lights 
Were needed there in those old-time rites ; 
There was only the light from some honest eyes 
Up-raised to the velvet evening skies ; 
And the only crown was the flower wreath 
Set light on the curling locks beneath, 
And the mystic grip was the tender squeeze 
Of our hands as we roamed past the orchard 

trees ; 
And the head of the lodge was an elfin chap 
With roses heaped in his dimpled lap. 

— With wings a-spread and his locks a-blow, 
And the wand of his office a silver bow. 

He welcomed the timid neophytes. 

And into the hearts of his pure delights 

He led each happy candidate 

Who breathed Love's password at the gate, 

And happy he who sought degrees 

In the O. K. K. B. W. P's. 

'Tis just a page from the dear conceit 

That makes the volume of school life sweet ; 

— A bit of a jest from the callow days 

When we bashfully trudged the self-same ways 
As the girls from the evening meeting took. 
And we carried their capes and the singing-book. 

— Sauntered along the dim old lanes 
With chirrup and chatter and gay refrains, 



206 UP IN MAINE 

Shouting " Good-nights " as here and there, 

Pausing by gate or stile, a pair 

Loitered a bit on the threshold's stone 

For a sweet and fond good-night of their own. 

It irks me, friend, that I must profane 

The oath of the order and voice that chain 

Of mystic letters : yet 'twere not kind 

To take you thus far and leave you blind. 

And I'll whisper, you know, just heart to heart, 
'Twas " One Kind Kiss Before We Part," 
The mystic grip was a warm hand-press. 
The sign and the test a swift caress. 
And the dearest and sweetest of Used-to-be's 
Were the O. K. K. B. W. P's. 



GOIN' T' SCHOOL 207 

AT THE OLD "GOOL" 

" Ten, ten and a double ten, forty-five and then 

fifteen!" 
Stand you here, old friend of mine, close your 

eyes the while you lean 
Your silvered hair against the wood that's silvered 

too, by sun and rain, 

— The butt of storms as well as we, — old aliens 

crawling back to Maine. 

The driving sleet, the drifting snows have filched 
away the vivid red 

That matched, as I remember it, the flaming top- 
knot on your head. 

And this — so gaunt, so bent, so small — it seems, 
alas, a wooden ghost 

Of what it was wken it was " gool " : the school- 
house's old red hitching-post ! 

And ah, old friend, to lean your brow upon its 
crest you have to stoop ; 

— You had to stretch to reach its top in those 

old days of hide-and-coop. 
" Ten, ten and a double ten," 
That's the way we counted then; 
— Counted hundreds rapidly. 
Begged the happy days to flee. 
Moments were not precious then. 
What we hoard to-day as men. 



208 UP IN MAINE 

Then we flung in careless way ; 

Counting life as when at play ; 

" Blinding " at the old red post, 

We strove to see who'd count the most. 

" Forty-five and then fifteen, — " 

Lavish then : ah, now we glean 

On our bended knees as men 

What we flung uncounted then. 
Friend, old friend, the past troops back 
With all its smiles and all its sighs, 
When I was "It," 
And the world was lit 
By the star-shine of two soft brown eyes. 

" Ten, ten, and a double ten, forty-five and then 

fifteen!" 
That talisman of boyhood days has brought a 

sorrow that is keen. 
And yet there's joy along with pain ; let me bow 

my head here too. 
And here with brow upon this wood I'll tell you 

what you never knew. 
You've asked me many times, old friend, the 

secret of an unwed life; 
I'll tell you now : I loved but once ; that girl 

loved you; she was your wife. 
I loved her in those boyhood days, but in Life's 

game of counting out 



GOIN' T SCHOOL 209 

Fate's happy finger stretched to you, and I — 

poor awkward, bashful lout — 
Just stepped aside. But 'twas all right! I'm 

not the sort to curse and whine. 
My joy has been that she was yours, so long as 

she could not be mine. 
— My joy, old friend, is now to say, as here we 

clasp this worn old post, * 

There is no heart-burn in my past, no shimmer of 

a jealous ghost. 
For boyhood's lesson taught me this : 'Tis only 

some egregious fool 
Who rails at Fate and storms the skies because 

some better man " tags gool." 
I've been content to stand there, friend, while 

one by one the eager troop 
Of boyhood's chums have won their goal in Life's 

more earnest hide-and-coop. 
Thank God, old chum, we still clasp hands and 

pledge again our boyhood ties. 
Though I've been '' It," 
And your world is lit 
By the star-shine of her soft brown eyes. 



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